The government will hold a workshop on the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA) for parliamentarians next month, ahead of the agreement's tabling in the House.

International Trade and Industry Minister Mustapa Mohamed said the full-day workshop would start with a brief introduction about the agreement, before the parliamentarians adjourn to separate workshops focusing on various parts of the agreement.

“Anyone interested about medicine can go to the workshop about medicine; anyone interested about investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) can go to the workshop about ISDS. That is in the works.

“It will involve all (government) departments. All of them (such as) the attorney-general's chambers (AGC), and so on,” he told reporters when met in Kuala Lumpur today.

He was speaking to reporters before attending a briefing with university students at his ministry's headquarters.

Mustapa added that starting from the first week of January, there would be briefings on the TPPA in other states as well, including for the members of the public.

Members of the media, including the electronic media, would also get their own briefing, he said.

To a question, Mustapa said he had met Attorney-General Mohd Apandi Ali yesterday who said he was still identifying what laws would need to be changed to ratify the TPPA.

Yesterday, Mustapa reportedly said two days have been set aside for the Dewan Rakyat and one day for the Dewan Negara to debate the TPPA. The dates would be announced later.

There would be no opportunity to make amendments to the agreement and it would have to be approved or rejected as a whole.

The agreement itself is slated to be signed in February next year in New Zealand, after which would follow a two-year ratification period.

Latest FTA a success

During a briefing with the students later, Mustapa said Malaysia's latest free trade agreement (FTA) which was with Turkey had been a boon for the country's economy.

“ It is one of the most successful trade agreements that we have signed,” he said.

The agreement came into effect on Aug 15 and has already increased trade especially in terms of palm oil and polyester exports.

This is because Turkey imposes a 60 percent tariff on palm oil imports into the country but an exception was made for Malaysia following the free trade agreement.

Nevertheless, he conceded that the TPPA was more controversial while the Malaysia-Turkey FTA was a 'traditional FTA' that only dealt with goods and services.

In contrast, the TPPA is a much broader agreement also encompasses environmental and labour issues as well.