Third, China must enhance its say in regional and global matters by actively participating in FTAs. The world's economic landscape has been transformed. The rise of new emerging economies has caused changes in the dominant force in global trade. The global trade governance pattern is in a period of adjustment. The trend is for economies to influence global economic governance through setting, shaping and implementing global investment and trade rules. One effective way to influence global economic rules is to participate and lead in FTAs.

Against this backdrop, China particularly needs to cement its position in Asia-Pacific FTAs. There are three approaches it could adopt to accomplish this.

China needs to have an open attitude toward the Trans-Pacific Partnership. The TPP, dominated by the US, is leading the future of the global economy and trade rules by establishing high standards for regional agreements. China has realized that it must pay attention to the next generation of trade issues if the country is going to participate in the negotiations of international trade rules and be an important participant in a new round of global trade pattern reconstruction. In the short term, China is not prepared to join the TPP negotiations, but in the long run, high levels and high standards of trade and investment rules are good for China's industrial structure adjustment and upgrading. Therefore, the possibility cannot be ruled out that China will join the TPP talks in the coming years.

In terms of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, China should let ASEAN lead the pact. At the same time, China needs to uphold the principle of considering the different stages of development among RCEP economies. The RCEP covers 16 countries, including the 10 countries of the ASEAN, China, Japan, South Korea, India, Australia and New Zealand. These countries account for 49 percent of the world's population, 32 percent of the world's GDP, 30 percent of the world's trade and 20 percent of its foreign direct investment. Once the trade agreement is reached, the economic growth and trade expansion effect will be significant.

But the RCEP faces big disparities among its members in national development, and increasingly serious differences in their standpoints and negotiating claims. Some developed countries such as Japan and South Korea tend to focus on market and investment access. Some developing countries such as India insist on more attention to development issues. China should fully play the role of a great regional power, closing differences between the parties, fostering negotiations and making it an important way to achieve integration in the Asia-Pacific region.

As for the Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific, which represents the ultimate goal of integration in the region, it was not a new issue when it was first proposed by China last year at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting. In fact, as early as the 2006 APEC meeting in Hanoi, Vietnam, former US president George W. Bush held a positive attitude toward the idea, supporting the strengthening of research on the concept. Economists have recognized the idea of "the bigger, the better" when it comes to such a free trade agreement. Once a comprehensive free trade agreement is reached, covering 21 Asia-Pacific economies, it will exceed other regional integration agreements for its huge market size, growth potential, and trade and investment earnings.

China and the US have differences in the path of promoting Asia-Pacific regional cooperation and integration. China is not in the TPP, while the US is not in the RCEP. The two deals are competing with each other in the region. In this context, the proposed FTAAP roadmap has reduced the differences between China and the US to a certain extent. The FTAAP, TPP and RCEP could become steppingstones to ultimately realize economic integration in the Asia-Pacific.

The author is a researcher at the Institute of World Economics and Politics of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.