The Role of ASEAN+5 Trade Agreement in Boosting Agricultural Exports: Insights and Implications for the RCEP Agreement

The ASEAN Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) agreement is the world’s largest free trade agreement, which aims to deepen economic integration in East Asia, with ASEAN as a hub. This study examines the impact of the ASEAN regional trade agreement with five major partner countries, which was then consolidated into a single free trade agreement, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, on Indonesian agricultural exports, including the three major commodities of palm oil, rubber, and coconut. The Poisson Pseudo-Maximum Likelihood (PPML) approach was employed to examine the impact of Indonesia’s participation in the ASEAN+5 FTAs on its exports to 35 major partner countries over the period from 2000 to 2020. The empirical findings suggest that Indonesia’s involvement in the ASEAN+5 agreement, which serves as a proxy for the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), has had a positive effect on its rubber exports, but a negative and significant impact on the exports of aggregate agriculture, palm oil, and coconuts.