USTR announced today that the United States and Taiwan "have concluded negotiations on the U.S.-Taiwan Initiative on 21st Century Trade," and released the full text of an agreement.

After months of negotiations, China and Ecuador signed a bilateral trade agreement last week. This makes Ecuador the fourth country in the Latin American region to have a trade agreement with China.

Without providing further details, top trade officials in the United States and Taiwan both put a positive spin on the ongoing trade negotiations that were launched last summer. A Taiwanese official indicated that the trade talks are at the tail-end of the first phase of negotiations.

China's tariff commission announced today that starting on May 1, 60 types of goods from Nicaragua will be tariff free. This is part of an early agreement reached between the two governments, as a precursor of a more comprehensive trade agreement for which the negotiations are ongoing.

Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong visited Beijing last week and during his visit, the two governments announced "substantive" progress on the negotiations to expand their bilateral trade agreement, and reached agreements on food safety, dispute settlement, and R&D.

This week, China and ASEAN held the first round of negotiations, kicking off a process of upgrading their bilateral trade arrangements.

Officials from the United States and Taiwan held the second round of negotiations for the U.S.-Taiwan Initiative on 21st Century Trade this week in Taipei, and delivered some results that a Taiwanese top official said he is "quite satisfied with."