Overcoming thorny farm issues will be a key challenge as the United States and Japan take on their developing Southeast Asian allies in free-trade negotiations, analysts said.
Criticisms of the US-Australia free trade agreement underscore the potential minefields awaiting negotiators as they attempt to weave a web of free-trade pacts across a region where agriculture is the mainstay in several economies.
The US-Australia accord came under fire in Australia because it excludes sugar, largely maintains US protection on dairy and beef produce, and gives US pharmaceutical firms the right to appeal measures designed to keep the cost of medicines down.
The United States is due to start trade negotiations with Thailand this month, with Malaysia seen as next in line, possibly next year.
Japan has begun FTA talks with Thailand and the Philippines in among the many upcoming or current FTA negotiations in the region.
In the United States' free trade accord with Singapore, Washington's first with an Asian country, agriculture was not an issue because the city-state does not have a farm sector.
Kathie Krumm, a World Bank expert on trade and regional integration, said one danger of the web of bilateral and regional FTAs is that they may have "extensive provisions" for excluding sensitive sectors like agriculture.
This would "substantially reduce the potential for welfare gains from such arrangements," said Krumm, who co-edited East Asia Integrates, a recently published World Bank book.
The US-Asean Business Council, an influential business lobby group, said despite protectionist rhetoric, it will push Washington to deepen its trade engagement with Asean.
"Despite the furore over outsourcing and the kind of negative signals against trade, we believe that the trade agenda will move forward past the US-Singapore FTA," council president Ernest Bower told reporters here recently.
The council said Washington should aim to pass the US-Thailand FTA by 2005, prepare for free-trade talks with Malaysia, normalise trade ties with Laos and help Vietnam enter the World Trade Organisation.
Bower acknowledged that reaching agreement on farm issues will be a key challenge in the US-Thailand negotiations, which could serve as a "template" for future accords if successful.