Will the Philippines Benefit from the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership?

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The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) is a free trade area among the 10 member-states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations or ASEAN (i.e., Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao PDR, Myanmar, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Viet Nam) and six non-ASEAN countries in Asia and Oceania (i.e., Australia, China, Japan, South Korea, New Zealand, and India). The economies covered in the RCEP have a total gross domestic product (GDP) of USD 21 trillion in 2013, and a population of 3.4 billion. This Policy Note examines the potential effects of the reduction in RCEP tariffs and nontariff barriers on the Philippine economy using mathematical modeling.