This chapter focuses on regional efforts to encourage freer trade and investment.
Regional integration is defined and the benefits and drawbacks associated with it are identified.
We then explore in detail some long-established trading agreements and some agreements in the earliest stages of development. Regional economic integration is the process whereby countries in a geographic region cooperate with one another to reduce or eliminate barriers to the international flow of products, people, or capital. A regional trading bloc is a group of nations in a geographic region undergoing economic integration. Policies different members establish against nonmember countries can differ greatly Customs Union - A customs union is economic integration whereby countries remove all barriers to trade between themselves but erect a common trade policy against nonmembers. It differs from a free trade area in that members treat all nonmembers similarly.