Mr. Chair, I would agree with the statement that this is a region that has huge opportunities for Canada and for many of our major trade partners that are growing in importance for us.
We actually already have one deal almost in hand. It's before the House now to ratify, which is of course, CPTPP, the trans-Pacific partnership. That will bind us into a free trade agreement with a number of major economies in the region. Notably, Japan, our fourth-largest trading partner, but also a number of ASEAN countries are members of CPTPP. That is for us a first and important step.
I think there's been some suggestion of RCEP being somehow a rival of CPTPP. There are different sets of players, but I think there's potential for them to be complementary. There is some overlap in membership. We're certainly following with interest the progress on RCEP. It's probably a slightly less ambitious deal than is CPTPP but it is of interest. Certainly a shared goal for all in the region is ultimately a free trade area of Asia-Pacific. That is one of the goals that have been expressed collectively through our membership in APEC, Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation.