社评：区域经济合作，大势所趋丨RCEP boosts economic integration

The signing of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership offers a badly needed boost to regional economic confidence, and may serve as a crucial first step toward the redrawing of the global economic map over time.As such, the deal has historic implications not only for the 15 signatories — the 10 members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, Australia, China, Japan, New Zealand and the Republic of Korea — but also potentially the world.Covering a combined population of 2.1 billion and accounting for nearly 30 percent of global GDP, the RCEP is the largest trade pact the world has ever seen — bigger than both the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement and the European Union single market.Although it does not go as far as the European Union in integrating member economies, for its commitment to progressively lower tariffs between the member economies alone over the coming ………………………………