BEIJING - The Japananese government will take concrete actions to produce tangible and meaningful outcomes on initiation of the Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific (FTAAP), said an official?in Beijing?on Friday.

"Japan welcomes the progress achieved thus far," Japanese Foreign Ministy spokesman Ken Okaniwa said in a press briefing during the ongoing Asian Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meetings.

"We believed that an FTAAP should be pursued as a comprehensive free trade agreement by developing and building on ongoing regional undertakings, such as...the Trans-Pacific Partnership(TPP) among others,"said the spokesman.

To this end, APEC will make an important and meaningful contribution as an incubator of an FTAAP by providing leadership and intellectual input into the process of this development, Ken said.

The realization of FTAAP is a long-standing consensus and vision of APEC economic leaders. One of this year's APEC outcomes, China expects, could be the start of the FTAAP process.

If APEC leaders reach consensus on launching the FTAAP process in the following meeting week, it will lay a sound foundation for the regional free trade zone and send a heartening signal to the global free trade momentum.