China , Singapore Sign Free Trade Deal That Includes Labour

CHINA and Singapore have signed a free trade agreement and a memorandum of understanding on bilateral co-operation on use of the labour force.

The agreement covers a wide range of sectors including commodity trade, service trade, transfer of workers and easing customs clearance. The two countries have accelerated the progress of implementing free trade by strengthening their economic cooperation and expanding resources it covers.

According to the agreement, Singapore will exempt all tariffs on imports from China starting from January 1, while China will impose zero tariff on 97.1 per cent of the imports from Singapore from January, 2012. The two sides also pledged to launch deeper co-operation than the WTO level on service trades such as health care, education and accounting.

Transpacific Stabilisation Agreement Sees Slowdown to H2 2009

TRANSPACIFIC Stabilisation Agreement (TSA) carriers see a slow down in cargo volume ahead following a first half drop of 6.9 per cent, going to eight per cent fall by the end of the year.

"Next year will be even worse. Many container shippers may book losses because global trade will probably have negative growth on the global recession and oversupply," said Gideon Lo, an analyst at DBS Vickers Hong Kong in a Bloomberg report.

But NOL chief executive and long-time TSA chief Ron Widdows voiced optimism: "We expect to see an orderly de-leveraging of the financial markets over the next year that will begin to restore confidence with year-on-year cargo demand growth resuming in late 2009."

Container shipping giant NOL has reported its first decline in three years of one per cent in the four weeks ending October 17 with China Shipping Container Lines posting third quarter losses. More alarming though, said the report, is that the largest company by market share, AP Moeller-Maersk, plans to cut Asia-Europe capacity and transpacific trade by 10 and 20 per cent respectively.

"We continue to face a very difficult macro-economic environment that is having a significant adverse impact on the markets we serve," said Chuck Raymond, CEO of Horizon Lines in response to its decision to reduce its workforce by 10 per cent in a cost-saving exercise of US$10 million, necessary steps to face the challenge ahead.