Between March 2019 and January 2020, four workshops were held to improve understanding of the negative list approach under the ASEAN Trade in Services Agreement (ATISA). The workshops were designed to help officials from each of the identified ASEAN Member States (AMS) to assess for themselves the value of the negative list approach. The workshops were held in Ha Noi in March 2019, Vientiane in October 2019, Phnom Penh in November 2019 and Nay Pyi Taw in January 2020.

These workshops resulted from the meetings held between the Coordinating Committee on Services (CCS) of AMS and Japan in March and May 2019, at which offers to provide capacity building around preparing the negative list were made. The trainers for the Viet Nam, Cambodia and Lao PDR workshop were Ms Emi Nagaoka, Attorney-at-Law, Baba & Sawada, Ms Avryl Lattin, Partner at Clyde & Co, Sydney, and Dr Intan M. Ramli (ERIA). The Myanmar workshop was facilitated by Mr Richard Braddock, Partner at Lexbridge Lawyers, Canberra, and Mr Ishido Shimpei, Attorney-at-Law at Nishimura and Asahi, and Dr Intan M. Ramli (ERIA).

The workshops covered issues including trade in services negotiating approaches, introduction to the negative list approach, practice on reading and writing negative lists and transposing from positive lists to negative lists. These workshops were primarily funded by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), Japan. Partnering with ERIA through ERIA’s Australian Government funded Capacity Building Programme, widened the perspectives shared with participants by bringing in Australian co-facilitators. Assessment was also done in terms of ascertaining the value of conducting these capacity building programme for the identified AMS.