Sri Lanka, Dec. 3 -- In November 2020, in the midst of the global pandemic, after eight years of economic and political considerations, the much talked about Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) was signed among 10 South East Asian countries: Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam, together with their FTA partners such as South Korea, China, Japan, Australia and New Zealand.

(1) The new free trade bloc of 15 states will be the biggest, surpassing both the US-Mexico-Canada agreement and European Union (EU). The total population of the RCEP is 2.1 billion people and accounts for 29 percent of global domestic production. The Peterson Institute for International Ec...