By Rowan Callick, Asia-Pacific editor
The Australian
AUSTRALIAN businesses will today start to benefit from the country's biggest free trade agreement -- with the 600 million people of southeast Asia.
Australia already has FTAs with Singapore and Thailand. But the new deal links Australia and New Zealand with all 10 countries of the Association of South East Asian Nations.
In the past financial year, Australia's trade with ASEAN totalled $83 billion, 15 per cent of the country's total trade -- almost the share claimed by China, Australia's top trading partner.
The FTA takes effect in stages. By 2020, it will eliminate tariffs on 96 per cent of the goods exported to ASEAN countries.
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