Despite trade deals, trade between Japan and Britain has plummeted.
(Photo: dpa)
London Despite a trade pact with the Asian country, post-Brexit trade between Britain and Japan has plummeted. Official figures from the Department of Commerce show that the volume of trade between the two countries fell from £28.8 billion in 2019 to £24.9 billion in 2020 and £23.7 billion last year, as reported the “Observer” analyzed on Sunday.
Great Britain left the European Union in 2020 and signed a trade pact with Japan in the same year. The deal, signed by ex-Prime Minister Liz Truss as Trade Secretary at the time, was hailed as a “milestone for Britain” intended to give a massive boost to trade.
Opposition Labor Party trade officer Nick Thomas-Symonds said: “The falling trade with Japan is irrefutable evidence that the government is not acting in the interests of British exporters.”
An expert from Sussex University Business School, Minako Morita-Jaeger, pointed out in The Observer that Japan’s trade with Britain has fared significantly worse than trade with the European Union or many other countries.
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A UK Department of Commerce spokesman nonetheless defended the trade deal, citing expected benefits in the future. Global trade has been adversely affected by the corona pandemic and other factors in recent years.
For Brexit advocates, the trade agreements are a sore point: there is also criticism of a pact negotiated with Australia, and even a cabinet member admitted weaknesses. The long-awaited trade agreement with the USA is a long way off.
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