In May 2022 the Biden Administration launched negotiations with thirteen countries throughout the Asia Pacific region on, what it described as, a new type of trade and economic agreement called the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity (IPEF). The first formal negotiating round took place 10-15 December 2022 in Brisbane, Australia and the next round has just been announced for 8-11 February 2023 in India. While the Administration has also launched a similar trade and economic initiative in the Americans called the Americas Partnership for Economic Prosperity (APEP), as well as a bilateral negotiation with Taiwan called the U.S. – Taiwan Initiative on 21st Century Trade, IPEF is the Administration’s first major trade-related initiative and its provisions are likely to serve as a blueprint for APEP and any other future trade negotiations. In addition to being broader in scope than an traditional trade agreement (IPEF’s negotiating mandate covers trade, supply chains, climate and anticorruption) another key feature that distinguishes IPEF from other traditional trade agreements is the Administration’s decision to not negotiate tariff reductions—or traditional market access commitments. While the Administration has said that the broad set of commitments in IPEF will be “enforceable”, traditional trade agreements use dispute settlement mechanisms and the threat of the removal of tariff concessions, specifically, as leverage to enforce commitments. With no tariff concessions at play, the Administration faces the novel task of developing a new type of enforcement mechanism for IPEF – one that will look and operate differently from traditional dispute settlement under existing U.S. trade deals.
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