In the second part of a wide-ranging interview, Borderless News Online asked Indonesian Trade Minister Thomas Lembong how he feels about U.S. Republican front runner Donald Trump’s bashing of the Trans Pacific Partnership – or TPP – a trade agreement that would give Indonesia and a spate of other nations preferential access to U.S. markets.
Lembong did not mention Trump specifically, but expressed concern with what is often an anti-free trade attitude in Western countries.
Indeed, the New York real estate tycoon has called TPP a” bad deal,” and has equated it with the steady loss of U.S. manufacturing jobs over the decades to nations in Asia and Latin America. This comes at a time when the United States still has not recovered from the 2008 economic crises, as millions remain unemployed and underemployed.
Lembong expressed concern over anti free trade views Western nations:
Q: If I could get on to the US elections, some candidates might not be fans of TPP. What are your thoughts on how some of those candidates, if elected, might impact global trade?
A: “I was somewhat dismayed recently to read that in fact both in the USA and even in Europe, majorities of the public are very skeptical about free trade. And secondly, I believe that there are significant sectors of society in the West or, for lack of a better word, the rich world, that feel left behind, that they haven’t participated fairly in the benefits of global trade, global capitalism.”
“I think, you know, we policy makers, and political leaders and advocates of free trade have to do a better job of advocating it. Of explaining with very concrete example, how everybody’s benefiting,” he said.
“We teach our kids what’s on the inside of living cells, but they have no idea where their sports shoeor their iPhone comes from. If you are a user of an iPhone or an Android phone, or if you wear any of the popular sneaker brands, you are a beneficiary of global trade,” he said.
“But I think we haven’t done a good job of explaining that to the public,” he said.
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