The Bangkok Agreement was established in 1975. Member countries are Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, China, the Republic of Korea and Lao People’s Democratic Republic. The Bangkok Agreement has recently been revised and renamed as the Asia Pacific Trade Agreement (APTA). The APTA has come into force from 1 July 2006. The APTA contains consolidated list of tariff concessions granted by member countries to each other. Under this agreement, China has provided 100% tariff concessions to 83 items of Bangladesh at 8-digit level and Republic of Korea has provided 100% tariff concessions to 139 items at 10-digit level.

3rd round of trade negotiations under this preferential trading bloc was completed in 2006. The 4th round of preferential tariff negotiations has been kicked off according to the decision of the 2nd Ministerial Council held in Goa, India on 26 October 2007. In the 4th round tariff negotiations member countries negotiating on exchange on tariff concessions, Trade Facilitation, Trade in Services, Investment and Rules of Origin. Bangladesh is participating to the working groups on the framework agreements on Trade Facilitation, Trade in Services, Investment and Rules of Origin.

During the preferential tariff negotiations, Bangladesh had bilateral meetings with China, South Korea and Lao PDR. Bangladesh delivered the request list on tariff concession to Lao PDR but Lao PDR did not give any request list to Bangladesh. China offered tariff concessions at 50% on 1058 tariff lines, which they indicated will be applicable to all countries. In this offer list, no special concessions were made to LDCs. Bangladesh handed over its initial offer list to China reserving the right to alter /modify it if need be. The offer list of Bangladesh covered 78 products with margin of preference ranging from 30% to 70%. The Republic of Korea was not ready to exchange the offer list and hence Bangladesh did not handed over the offer list to Korea. It was agreed that Bangladesh and South Korea will exchange their offer lists before the thirty-second session of the Committee. Regarding the exchange of request lists between the Bangladesh, India and Sri Lanka, it was agreed in 30th session that since Bangladesh, India and Sri Lanka have been reducing the tariffs under SAFTA, there would be no necessary to exchange the tariff concessions among these three countries under the APTA.

Under the 4th round of preferential tariff negotiations six meetings were held. 34th Session of APTA will be held in Bangkok on 31October-01 November 2009. It is mentionable that APTA ministerial council is expected to be held on 15 December 2009 at Seoul.

The BIMSTEC Framework Agreement was signed in June 1997 and Agreement on FTA concluded in February 2004. Member countries are Bangladesh, India, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Nepal and Bhutan. Under the Agreement, in case of First Track products, non-LDCs will open up their markets for the products of LDCs in 1 year and LDCs will do the same for non-LDCs in 5 years. On the other hand, for Normal Track products, non-LDCs will open up their market for the products of LDCs in 3 years and the LDCs will follow 10 year schedule in order to open up their markets for the products of non-LDCs. Least Developed Member Countries of BIMSTEC FTA will enjoy special and differential treatment.

A BIMSTEC Trade Negotiating Committee (TNC) has been constituted to conduct negotiations on trade in goods, trade in services and investment. The Committee has undertaken negotiations on trade in goods, trade in services and investment. The BIMSTEC FTA on trade in goods was scheduled to enter into force from 1 July 2006. Negotiations on trade in goods are yet to be completed due to divergence in opinion. It has already held 18 meetings. The 19th meeting of BIMSTEC Trade Negotiating Committee (TNC) is expected to be held in India 17-19 November 2009.

To promote and sustain mutual trade and the economic cooperation among the SAARC countries through exchanging concessions on trade measures SAARC Preferential Trading Arrangement (SAPTA) was signed in 11th April 1993 and operationalized in December 1995 to give limited preferential market access to exports of member countries. Since 1995 there were four rounds of negotiation for tariff concessions, the last of which was completed in December 2002. Negotiations were confined solely to the issue of tariff cuts. The issue of para-tariff and non-tariff measures was left out altogether. The member countries of the Agreement are Bangladesh, Bhutan, Maldives, India, Pakistan, Nepal and Sri Lanka. The basic principle of SAPTA was:
 

The Agreement on South Asian Free Trade Area (SAFTA) was signed on 6 January 2004 in Islamabad. SAFTA has entered into force from 1st January 2006 after completion of national ratification by all member countries. Tariff reduction under SAFTA has started from 1 July 2006. The member countries of the Agreement are Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Maldives, India, Pakistan, Nepal and Sri Lanka.

All member countries maintain a sensitive list. Products appearing in the sensitive lists will not enjoy tariff concessions. The sensitive lists of Bangladesh contain 1254 items for Non-LDCs and 1249 items for LDCs. The sensitive list of India contains 868 items for Non-LDCs and 480 items for LDCs; the list of Pakistan contains 1169 items, the list of Sri Lanka 1065 items, the list of Nepal 1299 items, the list of Maldives 671 items, the list of Afghanistan 1072 and the list of Bhutan 157 items.

Pakistan, India and Sri Lanka will bring down their tariff to 0-5 % for LDCs in 3 years. Such tariff reduction will be done by LDCs in 10 years. Tariff reduction (0-5%) will be accorded to those items which do not appear in the sensitive lists.

The general criterion of SAFTA Rules of Origin is CTH (Change of Tariff Heading) + 40% value addition for Non-LDCs and CTH + 30% value addition for LDCs. There is also a product specific rule for 191 items where general criterion does not apply. Under regional cumulation rules of SAFTA, there is the provision of value addition criterion only. In this case, the regional value addition is 50%, of which 20% has to be in the final exporting country.

India has provided to LDCs duty free market access to all products under SAFTA (excepting the products retained in their sensitive list) which has come into effect from 1 January 2008. Recently India has offered duty free tariff preferences (DFTP) scheme for all 50 LDCs. Bangladesh is considering the proposal of signing the letter of intent. Bangladesh may thank India for providing duty free access of 8 (eight) million pieces of apparel articles in one calendar year covered under the SAFTA Sensitive List of India without any conditionalities of sourcing of fabrics or port restrictions under a Memorandum of Understanding Signed between The Government of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh & The Government of Republic of India on 16 September 2007.

India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka will extend technical assistance to LDC members for development of trade-related capacity. The technical assistance will be in the forms of training, study, seminar, workshop, export promotion projects, product development, trade policy formulation, etc.

• 3rd SAFTA COE and 3rd SAFTA Ministerial Council meeting was held in New Delhi on 1-2 and 3 March 2008 respectively. Bangladesh delegation took part in the SAFTA COE meeting and honourable advisor for commerce attended the ministerial council meeting. Bangladesh position was firmed up through an inter-ministerial meeting held on 18 February 2008 under the chairmanship of Secretary Ministry of Commerce.

• Protocol of accession of Islamic Republic of Afghanistan to Agreement on South Asian Free Trade Area was signed during the 15th SAARC Summit held in Colombo on 2-3 August 2008 and a summary was sent to the cabinet committee on 15.10.08 for post facto approval and ratification of the protocol. The cabinet committee approved the approval and ratification proposal of the protocol on 26 October 2008 and this decision has been communicated to Ministry of Foreign affairs for onward transmission to SAARC Secretariat.

• The 5th SAFTA COE and 4th Expert Group meeting on SAARC Framework Agreement on Trade in Services (SAFAS) followed by SAFTA Ministerial council will be held in Nepal on 24-28 October 2009.

The south Asian trading bloc SAFTA has attempted to expand its coverage through inclusion of trade in services in to the agreement. As per decision of the 13th SAARC Summit held in Dhaka in 2005 &14th SAARC Summit held in New Delhi in 2007 and SAFTA Ministerial Council a regional Study on Potential for Trade in Services under SAFTA Agreement was conducted by the Research and Information System for Developing Countries (RIS), India with the inputs from National experts of each SAARC countries. The Study report was submitted at the Third meeting of the SAFTA Ministerial Council held in March 2008, which requested the RIS to draft an Agreement on Trade in Service under SAARC and established an Expert Group on Trade in Service.

The RIS submitted the Draft Agreement in August 2008 and the Expert Group held its first meeting in November 2008. In the draft Agreement on Trade in Service contains Preamble and 33 Articles. Most of the Articles are similar to GATS Agreement. So far, two rounds of negotiations were concluded. The First Meeting of the Expert Group on SAARC Framework Agreement on Trade in Services was held at the SAARC Secretariat, Kathmandu, Nepal on 6-7 November 2008 and second meeting was held at the same venue on 20-21 January 2009. The next Meeting of the Expert Group on SAARC Framework Agreement on Trade in Services will be held on 24-25 October 2009 at the SAARC Secretariat, Kathmandu, Nepal.

An inter-ministerial meeting was held to firm up Bangladesh's position regarding bilateral FTA with India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka under the chairmanship of honourable Commerce adviser in August 2008. Along with other decisions, it was decided that a Core group will be formed headed by CEO of BFTI Dr. Mohammad Ali Taslim with representatives from different relevant stakeholders. The committee has already submitted its report to Secretary, MoC recently.