Vietnam, S. Korea formally ink free trade agreement

Vietnam and South Korea formally signed here a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) on Tuesday.

The FTA was signed by Vietnamese Minister of Industry and Trade Vu Huy Hoang and ROK's Minister of Trade, Industry and Energy Yoon Sang-jick on behalf of the two governments with the attendance of Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung.

The FTA was reached after over two years of conducting eight rounds of formal negotiations and eight rounds of talks at the delegation head level and mid-term negotiations. The signing of the agreement contributes positively to the development of bilateral relations between the two countries, said the website of Vietnamese government.

The FTA consists of 17 chapters, 208 articles, 15 appendices and one deal on regulation enforcement.

The agreement covers contents on trade in goods and services, investment, intellectual property, food safety and animal-plant quarantine, rules of origin, customs facilitation, trade remedies, technical barriers to trade, e-commerce, competition, economic cooperation, institutions and legal affairs, among others.

After the signing, both sides will ratify the agreement following each country's legal regulations. The FTA will come into effect on the first day of the second month from the date when the completion of the internal procedures are announced in writing through diplomatic channels or from another date as agreed by the two sides.

Vietnam and South Korea established diplomatic ties in 1992. Bilateral trade turnover between the two countries reached over 28. 8 billion U.S. dollars in 2014. Endi