SMALL COUNTRIES CAN BE PATHFINDERS
Singapore and New Zealand are two small and open economies that are looking to set more innovative and high standards for themselves, said Mr Wong.
“Usually, these standards are adopted by others; be it ASEAN (the Association of Southeast Asian Nations) or other groupings,” he said.
Mr Wong was responding to a question on how the Singapore-New Zealand CSP will be useful as a pathway to an ASEAN-New Zealand CSP.
He gave examples of bilateral or plurilateral agreements Singapore has signed with other countries, such as the The Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), a free trade agreement between 12 economies, and the Digital Economy Agreement (DEA), which builds trust and interoperability between countries’ digital systems.
Singapore last month announced it was part of a Future of Investment and Trade (FIT) Partnership between 13 other countries aimed at supporting open and fair trade.
“And these are setting new standards for ourselves and for the world, and we hope that these new standards in time to come will be adopted by ASEAN and perhaps by other groupings as well,” he said.
He said that the freshly inked CSP between Singapore and New Zealand will allow for more interactions between New Zealand and ASEAN.
“The initiatives that we have with one another are also useful as pathfinders for ASEAN and also for groupings outside of ASEAN,” he added.
Agreeing with Mr Wong, Mr Luxon said that the benefit of being a leader of a small country is that they can be agile and innovative.
“You can move with great speed and agility and pioneer and innovate and have a positive view on where we think the world can go, and we can model that out for others and encourage others to come and join us along the way as well,” he said.
