<P> The Advent of Trade Blocs tend to draw in some parity between high - income industrial countries and developing countries with a much lower income base in that they tend to serve as equal partners under such a system . The concept of equal partners grew out of the concept of providing reinforcement to the economies to all the member countries . The various countries then agree upon the fact that they will help economies to maintain the balance of trade between and prohibit the entry of other countries in their trade process . </P> <P> An important example would be the North American Free Trade Area, formed in 1994 when the Canada - US Free Trade Agreement was extended to Mexico . Another vibrant example would entail as to how EU has formed linkages incorporating the transition economies of Eastern Europe through the Europe Agreements . It has signed agreements with the majority of Mediterranean countries by highly developing the EU - Turkey customs union and a Mediterranean policy . </P> <P> Regional integration in Europe was consolidated in the Treaty on the European Union (the Maastricht Treaty), which came into force in November 1993 and established the European Union . The European Free Trade Association is a free trade bloc of four countries (Iceland, Liechtenstein, Switzerland and Norway) which operates in parallel and is linked to the European Union . In January 1994, the North American Free Trade Agreement was formed when Mexico acceded to a prior - existing bilateral free trade agreement between the US and Canada . In The Pacific there was the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA) in 1993 which looked into reducing the tariffs . The AFTA started in full swing in 2000 . </P> <P> In the last decade regional integration has accelerated and deepened around the world, in Latin America and North America, Europe, Africa, and Asia, with the formation of new alliances and trading blocks . However, critics of the forms this integration has taken have consistently pointed out that the forms of regional integration promoted have often been neoliberal in character, in line with the motives and values of the World Trade Organization, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank - promoting financial deregulation, the removal of barriers to capital and global corporations, their owners and investors; focusing on industrialisation, boosting global trade volumes and increasing GDP . This has been accompanied by a stark increase in global inequality, growing environmental problems as a result of industrial development, the displacement of formerly rural communities, ever - expanding urban slums, rising unemployment and the dismantling of social and environmental protections . Global financial deregulation has also contributed to the increasing frequency and severity of economic crises, while Governments have increasingly lost the sovereignty to take action to protect and foster weakened economies, as they are held to the rules of free trade implemented by the WTO and IMF . </P>

Explain the various barriers to free trade and the motives for their use