The TPP was a major multilateral trade agreement among 12 Pacific Rim nations that collapsed after U.S. withdrawal, leading to a successor pact excluding the United States.
Key Facts
- Member countries
- 12 Pacific Rim nations
- Signing date
- February 4, 2016
- U.S. withdrawal
- January 2017 under President Trump
- Successor agreement
- CPTPP, entered into force December 30, 2018
- Origin agreement
- Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership (P4), 2005
By the Numbers
Cause → Event → Consequence
The TPP grew out of the 2005 Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership among Brunei, Chile, New Zealand, and Singapore. Beginning in 2008, eight additional countries joined negotiations, aiming to reduce tariff and non-tariff trade barriers and create an investor-state dispute settlement mechanism across Pacific Rim economies.
Twelve Pacific Rim countries signed the TPP on February 4, 2016. The agreement was never ratified by the United States due to strong domestic political opposition, with both major 2016 presidential candidates opposing it. President Trump formally withdrew the U.S. from the agreement upon taking office in January 2017.
Without U.S. participation the TPP could not enter into force as required. The remaining eleven countries negotiated the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), which incorporated most TPP provisions and came into effect on December 30, 2018, after ratification by six of the signatories.