Australia pushes for trade deal with China

Australia needs more balance between give-and-take in order to get a free trade agreement (FTA) signed with China within the next 12 months, an Australian economist said Tuesday.

Meanwhile, China's commerce ministry said Tuesday that China hopes to sign an FTA with Australia as soon as possible.

"Australia has been trying to get an FTA signed for ages. We have had a change of government and the new administration has said that in the next 12 months they want to get free trade deals signed with China, Japan and Korea. That is quite likely," Alan Oster, chief economist at the National Australia Bank (NAB), told the Global Times on the sidelines of an FTA round-table discussion in Beijing Tuesday.

The problem is that Australia -initially wanted to get a lot without -giving enough back, Oster said, adding that Australian leaders should sit down to figure out what they can trade and get a deal signed.

Tony Abbott, who was elected as Australia's new prime minister in September, said in October that he wanted to get the long-anticipated free trade agreement with China signed within 12 months.

Australia's Industry Minister Ian Macfarlan also said at a mining conference held in Tianjin on November 3 that Australia is expecting to sign an FTA with China in the first half of next year.

China has been Australia's largest trade partner for years, with bilateral trade in goods reaching $122.2 billion in 2012. Negotiations on the Australia-China FTA started in 2005.

However, despite the large trade -volume between the two nations, the negotiations have stalled after 19 rounds of talks.

The two countries have had disagreements in areas such as investment, agriculture and services -during the -negotiations, Shen Danyang, spokesman for the Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM), said at a regular monthly press conference Tuesday.

Shen also said that China welcomes the positive attitude shown by the new Australian government toward the FTA negotiations and hopes both sides can get a deal signed as soon as possible, on the basis of mutual benefits and -balanced interests.

Australia's neighbor New Zealand signed an FTA with China in 2008, which ensures low tariffs for New Zealand's exports to China.

"The FTA between China and New Zealand also increases the pressure on Australian companies who feel they are at a disadvantage when selling products to China compared with their New Zealand counterparts," Zhao Yumin, a -research fellow at the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation under MOFCOM, told the Global Times Tuesday.

According to Zhao, China should be less worried about the potential negative impact of an FTA with Australia on its agriculture, as this would allow the FTA negotiations to move ahead more quickly.

"An FTA may affect domestic farmers but it can benefit China in the long term in terms of food security and economic restructuring," Zhao said.