ATLANTA — Pacific trade ministers are optimistic of closing a sweeping Pacific Rim trade deal after progress on Friday on hurdles involving autos, dairy products and intellectual property protections for expensive biologic drugs. Ministers represented in the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) talks in Atlanta met for 20 minutes before breaking for negotiators to resume work on specific issues, work that Japan's Economy Minister Akira Amari said on Friday would likely go on all night. The United States and Australia are locked in intense negotiations over the length of time pharmaceutical companies have exclusive rights to produce and market next-generation medicines. Australia is one of a group of half a dozen countries resisting a US push to set a standard of eight years protection and see five years as a red line. Amari said talks on the issue of biologic drugs "were centered on the United States and Australia" and that negotiators were "putting their heads together" to try to find an agreement. On the third day of talks, major progress had been made on another key sticking point, the auto trade involving Japan, Canada, the United States and Mexico, Amari said, noting countries were "one step away from completion". He said that Mexico, Canada and Japan had neared terms of a deal on increased dairy market access and that the remaining issues involved New Zealand and the United States. — Reuters
