In a supermarket in Manchester, the UK (Photo: Xinhua/VNA)

The UK applied to join the CPTPP in 2021, signed the accession agreement in July 2023, and became a full member on December 15, 2024. This was the UK's largest trade deal since it left the European Union.

Gain for the UK

The CPTPP now has 12 members – Australia, New Zealand, Mexico, Peru, Chile, Singapore, Brunei, Malaysia, Vietnam, and three G7 countries (Canada, Japan, and the UK) – with a combined population of 580 million people. The UK, the world’s 6th largest economy, increases the CPTPP’s share of global GDP to about 15%.

British Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds said CPTPP membership could boost the UK’s economy by 2.5 billion USD a year as its businesses will now have access to a market of over 500 million people. It has joined a bloc of some of the world’s fastest-growing economies where it can flex its strength in financial technology, high-tech agriculture, and equipment manufacturing.

Joining the CPTPP validates the argument of the UK’s two largest political parties, the Conservative Party and the ruling Labor Party, that after Brexit, the UK would find it easier to sign free trade agreements with partners around the world and realize the “Britain Global” strategy. The UK has signed FTAs with Australia, New Zealand, and Singapore and is currently in negotiations with India. The CPTPP is its most significant agreement to date.

The new membership will partly offset Brexit’s negative impact on the UK’s economy – about 4% of GDP. Joining the CPTPP will boost UK’s GDP by about 0.08% in the long term. British High Commissioner to Singapore Nikesh Mehta expressed faith in a stronger CPTPP in the future.

"Joining CPTPP would potentially boost the UK's economy by 2.5 billion USD. That’s a pretty big number, but only considering the current CPTPP membership. With a more expansive CPTPP, more areas of cooperation, I believe the bloc will have a significant role and there will be more opportunities for British businesses.”

Other CPTPP members will access a market of 70 million people with strong purchasing power. The accession of another G7 country helps the CPTPP maintain its credibility after the US’s withdrawal in 2017 from the earlier Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP).

CPTPP’s new status

The UK’s accession to the CPTPP has great economic and geopolitical significance. Minako Morita-Jaeger, an expert on international trade at the University of Sussex, said that after the US’s withdrawal in 2017, the CPTPP has transformed into an economic bloc of middle powers who want to maintain an open, rules-based global trade order with high standards and be able to compete fairly with other major economies like the US, China, and the EU.

Morita-Jaeger said the UK will help the CPTPP protect law-based free trade and establish a more balanced position with major economic competitors. Also, the CPTPP will now expand beyond the Asia-Pacific region, setting a precedent for other countries to join.

Morita-Jaeger said that from an international trade policy perspective, the CPTPP rules have the potential to become a model for multilateralism. "The successful expansion of the CPTPP has given momentum to the multilateralization of the CPTPP and other organizations, such as the World Trade Organization. It can be said that the UK’s accession to the CPTPP sets a good precedent for future membership."

As a group of countries with different development levels, cultural backgrounds, and political systems, it’s still an open question whether the CPTPP can maintain its values and standards as it admits more new members. Many countries have already applied.

Wendy Cutler, Vice President of the Asia Society Policy Institute (ASPI) in the US, said CPTPP members should abandon any expectation of the US returning to the partnership in the near future, and should quickly improve its provisions to match the reality of global trade.

At a meeting last year on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit in San Francisco, CPTPP members discussed upgrading the agreement. Cutler said that should be done as soon as possible in the face of current political and economic upheavals.