SINGAPORE, May 4 (Reuters) – The leaders of Singapore and New Zealand signed an agreement to keep their supply chains open during times of crisis on Monday, and said they hoped the agreement would be a model for other countries to create a network of trusted partners.
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon witnessed the signing with his Singaporean counterpart, Lawrence Wong, on his visit to Singapore, which comes as global energy supplies are disrupted by the war in the Middle East. A third of New Zealand’s fuel is refined in Singapore.
The Agreement on Trade in Essential Supplies was concluded during Wong’s visit to New Zealand in October last year, before the Middle East conflict broke out. The agreement ensures both countries can continue to trade an agreed list of goods during times of crisis, including fuel, medical and construction-related products.
Wong said that he would welcome other countries in the region coming on board with the new standard, pointing to how an earlier partnership involving Brunei, Chile, New Zealand, and Singapore was expanded and eventually became the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal.
Luxon said he would welcome interest in the framework of the deal from like-minded countries, given the challenges of the geopolitical shift from a multilateral world guided by rules to a multipolar one driven by power.
“The agreement that we’ve just signed today, as a world first, is actually a good example of how we can model out and remake the case for multilateralism in the way we want to as well,” he said.
(Reporting by Jun Yuan Yong and Lucy Craymer; Editing by John Mair)
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