As a strong advocate for free trade, the ECA supports the TPP negotiations, with the hope that they produce a high quality, comprehensive agreement. There are currently 12 parties negotiating the Agreement, including Japan, the United States, Singapore, New Zealand and Malaysia, which are five of Australia’s top ten trading partners according to ABS statistics. AIBS 2014 results reinforce the importance of these markets to Australian companies with respondents nominating the United States as the top current export market, while New Zealand came in third, Japan fifth, Singapore sixth and Malaysia eighth.

The ECA appreciates from the research done by DFAT that potential gains to Australian exporters and importers, (including SMEs) from a comprehensive TPP Agreement are significant. The current parties to the TPP negotiations cover 11.2 per cent of the world’s population and approximately 70 per cent of Australia's trade flows through the Asia-Pacific region. This, coupled with the fact that Australia does not have existing trade agreements with a number of the current TPP negotiating parties, highlights the opportunity for market access gains to be made.