APEC ministers agree on regional free trade zone

Trade ministers at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Meeting have agreed to officially start work on creating a regional free trade area, Chinese Minister of Commerce Gao Hucheng said on Saturday.

"If it is approved at the leader's meeting, it will mean a concrete and substantive step forward for establishing the Free Trade Area of Asia-Pacific," Gao said at a news briefing after the two-day APEC ministerial meeting.

Beijing has been actively pushing for the creation of the FTAAP to fully unleash the region's economic power. The move has been widely viewed as China's response to the rise of a series of bilateral free trade agreements and large regional economic frameworks such as the US-led Trans-Pacific Partnership in the region.