Time to look beyond KORUS FTA
January 28, 2019
In his latest column for the Korea Times, KEI Senior Director Troy Stangarone brings readers' attention to opportunities where closer U.S.-Korea economic cooperation beyond the KORUS FTA might be most fruitful.
He points to two areas where this could start: energy and automated vehicles.
In the energy sector, the Moon administration has pledged to increase Korea's use of LNG and renewables in its energy mix. As Korea's long-term LNG contracts with Qatar, Oman, and others are set to expire in the years ahead, there is an opportunity to expand supplies to Korea from the United States.
To fully realize this, U.S. companies will need to invest in West Coast export terminals to ease exports to Korea and other countries in Asia. Korean firms should also consider investing in the U.S. LNG sector to better secure supply.
Another area of potential cooperation is automated vehicles. It will be important to develop international rules and regulations for autonomous vehicles. The United States and South Korea, as major automotive and ICT producers, have an interest in ensuring reasonable rules are developed.
Expanding cooperation in areas such as LNG and autonomous vehicles are just two of the promising areas where the public and private sectors could benefit from increased cooperation. A longer set of ideas that KEI's Troy Stangarone and Kyle Ferrier helped develop, alongside other notable thinkers in the U.S.-Korea relations space, can be found in Asia Society Policy Institute's newest paper, which can be found here
You can find Troy Stangarone's Korea Times column here