In London, on 29 December 2020, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the Socialist Republic of Viet Nam sign the Free Trade Agreement, together with an Exchange of Letters. The text, signed by Gareth Ward and Tran Ngoc An, is drawn up in the English and Vietnamese languages, each of these texts being equally authentic.

The Parties recognise that the Free Trade Agreement between the European Union and Viet Nam, done at Hanoi on 30 June 2019, sets out the preferential conditions of trade and investment that they wish to apply between them, and they desire that the rights and obligations provided for by that agreement should continue. Article 1 defines “mutatis mutandis” as the technical modifications necessary to apply the EU-Viet Nam FTA as if it had been concluded between the United Kingdom and Viet Nam, taking into account the object and purpose of this instrument, and “the Incorporated Agreement” as the EU-Viet Nam FTA to the extent incorporated here.

Article 2 incorporates the provisions of the EU-Viet Nam FTA in effect immediately before they cease to apply to the United Kingdom, mutatis mutandis, subject to this instrument, including the Annex and Protocol. Articles 1.3, 17.1.5, 17.16, 17.18.2, 17.22.2, 17.23, 17.24.1(a) and 17.25 are not incorporated. Article 3 takes the overriding objectives from incorporated Article 1.2. Article 4 applies the Agreement, in respect of the United Kingdom, to the extent that and under the conditions which the EU-Viet Nam FTA applied immediately before it ceased to apply, not including any areas covered by paragraph 2 of Article 17.24 of the EU-Viet Nam FTA.

Article 5 provides that references to the euro in the Incorporated Agreement shall continue to be read as such. Article 6 provides that if a time period in the EU-Viet Nam FTA has not yet ended, the remainder is incorporated; if it has ended, any ongoing rights or obligations apply between the Parties and that period is not incorporated, without affecting time periods relating to procedure or other administrative matters. Article 7 provides that the Trade Committee shall, in particular, ensure that this Agreement operates properly; decisions of the Trade Committee and Specialised Committees adopted before the EU-Viet Nam FTA ceased to apply to the United Kingdom are deemed adopted, mutatis mutandis, upon entry into force, without preventing later decisions that differ from, revoke or supersede them.

Article 8, acknowledging the importance to Viet Nam’s economy of the rice sector, provides that the Parties shall consider reviewing the appropriateness of the tariff rate quotas for rice in incorporated Section B of Annex 2-A after three years from entry into force, either in addition to or as part of consultations under incorporated Article 2.7.6; following any such review, a Party may consider a proposal from the other Party to amend those quotas, any amendments to come into effect in accordance with incorporated Article 17.5. The Annex scales down, relative to the EU-Viet Nam FTA volumes, the quotas in Sub-section 1 of Section B and provides that, on entry into force, the Parties continue the remaining stages of tariff reduction as if this Agreement had entered into force on the date of entry into force of the EU-Viet Nam FTA.

Article 9 requires each Party to notify the other of the completion of its applicable internal legal procedures for entry into force. Unless the Parties agree otherwise, the Agreement enters into force on the later of the first day of the second month following receipt of the latter notification and the date on which the EU-Viet Nam FTA ceases to apply to the United Kingdom. Pending entry into force, the Parties may provisionally apply it by an exchange of written notifications, from the date of receipt of the later notification; termination of provisional application takes effect on the first day of the second month following receipt of notice. Notifications go to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Viet Nam and to the United Kingdom’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office. Inconsistency with the Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland to the Withdrawal Agreement signed on 24 January 2020 does not prevent a Party from taking a measure relating to that inconsistency, provided it is not applied as arbitrary or unjustified discrimination or a disguised restriction on trade. The text is not the EU-Viet Nam FTA of 30 June 2019 taken as a stand-alone instrument, and not the CPTPP.

Image: Foreign and Commonwealth Office, Whitehall, London; Paul the Archivist, 21 May 2017; CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons. Cropped to 16:9.

Source consulted: United Kingdom-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement. Treaty text: Free Trade Agreement between the United Kingdom and Viet Nam, London, 29 December 2020, CS Viet Nam No.1/2021.