1 Introduction
Recently we have seen an exponential growth of trading partnerships.1 Across the world,
long standing barriers have been broken down. Relatively closed economies like Japan and
Korea, have announced negotiations for bilateral Free Trade Agreements (FTAs). Distant
neighbors such as New Zealand and Singapore have forged ahead with trade negotiations.
Countries, in Asia and Latin America are increasingly strengthening their trade ties.
In response to the increase in FTA’s across the world the US and Canada are also building
trading relationships across the world. The US has 15 bilateral, and 6 regional agreements
in place.2 Of these agreements 7 were signed recently (from 2004-2007) by the Bush
Government. Canada has FTA’s with the US, Mexico, Israel, Chile, and Costa Rica. Recently
Canada signed the Canada-European Free Trade Agreement (EFTA) in January 2008, an
FTA with Peru in May 2008, and an FTA with Colombia in June 2008.3 Canada is also
in the process of negotiating additional FTAs with a number of other partners, such as
Singapore, Korea, the FTA of the Americas, the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) and
the Dominican Republic.4
In this paper we study the Canada-Chile Free trade Agreement (CCFTA). The CCFTA
was signed in Santiago on December 5 1996 and came into force on July 5, 1997. It im-
1 Since 1995 over 245 trade arrangements have been notified to the WTO (www.wto.org).
2 Partner Countries: Australia, Bahrain, Chile, Colombia, Israel, Jordan, Malaysia, Morocco, Oman,
Panama, Peru, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea.
3 The Canada - European Free Trade Association (EFTA) was signed on 26-Jan-2008, and Canada - Peru
Free Trade Agreement was signed on 29-May-2008. As of June 7, 2008, Canada has also concluded free trade
agreement (FTA) negotiations with Colombia.
4 For more informatin please see the Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada website:
http://www.dfait-maeci.gc.ca/tnanac/reg-en.asp.