Ticker: Small business help in Boston; China, other partners sign world’s biggest trade pact - Boston Herald

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The city of Boston is offering more help to local small businesses struggling to stay viable amid the pandemic.

Mayor Martin Walsh announced three new relief funds totaling $6.3 million. One will provide up to $15,000 to small businesses that are struggling to pay their rent. Another will make $15,000 grants available to businesses owned by minorities, women or veterans. The third will offer grants to restaurants to enable them to retain or rehire employees.

Since the start of the pandemic the city has set aside more than $15 million in total to help businesses survive the economic downturn it has caused.

“The new funds we are announcing today will address those needs to better support the small businesses who have been hardest hit by the pandemic,” Walsh said.

China, other partners sign world’s biggest trade pact

China and 14 other countries agreed Sunday to set up the world’s largest trading bloc, encompassing nearly a third of all economic activity, in a deal many in Asia are hoping will help hasten a recovery from the shocks of the pandemic.

The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, or RCEP, was signed virtually on Sunday on the sidelines of the annual summit of the 10-nation Association of Southeast Asian Nations.

“I am delighted to say that after eight years of hard work, as of today, we have officially brought RCEP negotiations to a conclusion for signing,” said host country Vietnam’s prime minister, Nguyen Xuan Phuc.

“The conclusion of RCEP negotiation, the largest free trade agreement in the world, will send a strong message that affirms ASEAN’s leading role in supporting the multilateral trading system, creating a new trading structure in the region, enabling sustainable trade facilitation, revitalizing the supply chains disrupted by COVID-19 and assisting the post-pandemic recovery,” Phuc said.

The accord will take already low tariffs on trade between member countries still lower, over time, and is less comprehensive than an 11-nation trans-Pacific trade deal that President Trump pulled out of shortly after taking office.

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November 16, 2020 at 06:00AM
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Ticker: Small business help in Boston; China, other partners sign world’s biggest trade pact - Boston Herald
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