Biggest trade agreement attained by UK post-Brexit era.

The UK has agreed to join the Asia-Pacific Trade Agreement, the largest new trade deal since the UK left the European Union three years ago.

On Friday, the British government said it had reached an agreement to join the Comprehensive and Prospective Trans-Pacific Partnership, or CPTPPP, after nearly two years of negotiations.

She added that membership would lower tariffs on British dairy and other goods, as well as eliminate bureaucratic red tape on services, boosting the UK economy by £1.8bn ($2.2bn) “in the long run”.

British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said the deal “illustrates the real economic benefits of our post-Brexit freedoms.”

“Joining the CPTPB trade bloc places the UK at the center of a dynamic and growing group of Pacific economies, becoming the first new country and the first European country to join,” Sunak added.

The deal comes at a time when the UK is pursuing an “Indo-Pacific bias” in its economic and foreign policy in response to economic growth in the region and China’s growing influence on the world stage.

Critics said the deal with countries thousands of miles apart was insignificant compared to the UK’s trade with its neighbors in the 27-country European Union.

Brexit created barriers to trade between the UK and the bloc, which remains the UK’s biggest economic partner. The Government’s Fiscal Accountability Office said last November that Brexit had a “significantly negative impact on UK trade”.

Source: AB