IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/jfasei/v5y2023i2p109-128.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Identifying a Sustainable Path for RCEP: Global Overview and Comparative Analysis of Sustainable Development Provisions in Three Mega Regional Trade Agreements

Author

Listed:
  • Louise Malingrey
  • Yann Duval

Abstract

This article reviews the sustainable development content of regional trade agreements (RTAs) globally, followed by a comparative analysis of sustainable development-related provisions in the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) and two other recent ‘mega’ regional trade agreements (RTAs), namely the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) and the European Union—Japan Economic Partnership Agreement (EU—Japan EPA). The analysis covers seven sustainable development-related topics: (a) sustainable development as a concept, (b) labour rights and standards, (c) environment, (d) human rights, (e) small- and medium-sized enterprises, (f) health and (g) gender. The global review of more than 440 RTA texts confirms the increasing reference to sustainable development and related areas in RTAs signed over the past decade. The comparative analysis of the three mega-RTAs in turn confirms the large gaps of RCEP in terms of sustainable development coverage. However, it also points to specific and practical ways through which RCEP could address these gaps in time to support the achievement of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development—also drawing upon the interest expressed by many RCEP countries in joining CPTPP. A two-step path forward and different options for integrating sustainable development in RCEP are proposed, based on existing provisions and the differing approaches of the CPTPP and the EU-Japan EPA. JEL Classification: F14, F19

Suggested Citation

  • Louise Malingrey & Yann Duval, 2023. "Identifying a Sustainable Path for RCEP: Global Overview and Comparative Analysis of Sustainable Development Provisions in Three Mega Regional Trade Agreements," Journal of Asian Economic Integration, , vol. 5(2), pages 109-128, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:jfasei:v:5:y:2023:i:2:p:109-128
    DOI: 10.1177/26316846231184936
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/26316846231184936
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/26316846231184936?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Keywords

    International trade; sustainable development; RCEP; regional trade agreements; sustainability; CPTPP;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F14 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Empirical Studies of Trade
    • F19 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Other

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:jfasei:v:5:y:2023:i:2:p:109-128. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.