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(Bloomberg) -- Trade chiefs from some of the world’s biggest economies are competing for access to US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer as they seek to advance negotiations with Washington at a gathering in South Korea.

Greer arrived at the resort island of Jeju to join his counterparts at the meeting of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation members taking place Thursday and Friday. He then spoke with Chinese Vice Commerce Minister Li Chenggang, less than a week after the US and China agreed on a temporary cut in tariffs, according to a South Korean official with knowledge of the matter.

Over the course of the two days of the APEC meeting, representatives from member states will likely swap views on how to operate in a global economy that has been shaken by President Donald Trump’s barrage of tariffs. APEC slashed its growth forecasts for the year on the first day of the meeting in light of the current global trade environment.

Other member state trade officials are also expected to seek talks with Greer to try to blunt the impact of Trump’s trade policies. Those bilateral meetings will contrast with APEC’s longstanding objectives of furthering free trade through multilateral cooperation.

“For many trade ministers, securing a one-on-one meeting with USTR Greer will be their main goal,” said David Boling, Director of Japan Trade at the Eurasia Group and a former trade negotiator at the Office of the US Trade Representative. “They want a meeting with Greer, even if it is brief, to discuss the tariffs affecting their own economy. He will be the busiest trade minister there, and his schedule will be jampacked.”

The US and China are the biggest economies among the group’s 21 members, which APEC says account for around half of global trade and about 60% of global gross domestic product. The group cut its growth projection for member economies to 2.6% in 2025 compared with a 3.3% forecast just two months ago, as the fallout of tariffs hits.

“As a key driver in global trade, the APEC region faces a steeper growth downgrade than the rest of the world, driven by escalating trade disputes and policy uncertainty,” APEC said in a document.

The temporary tariff reprieve agreed by the US and China offers hope that the likely global hit from the levies can be scaled back.

Among other members, Canada, Mexico, South Korea, Japan, Australia and Vietnam are all caught in Trump’s cross hairs over trade.

“It is meaningful for the ministers to gather together for the first time since the Trump administration slapped massive tariffs around the world and discuss a way forward for the global trading system,” said Yeo Han-koo, a former South Korean trade minister who is now a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics. He described this week’s meeting as a building block for the APEC summit in November.

South Korea hosts APEC this year with a central theme of “Building a Sustainable Tomorrow” and aims to make progress in realizing the Putrajaya Vision 2040 for which leaders including Trump in 2020 agreed “to work together to deliver, a free, open, fair, non-discriminatory, transparent and predictable trade and investment environment.”

“Today, the global environment surrounding APEC economies faces many challenges,” South Korean Trade Minister Cheong Inkyo said in his opening remarks for the meeting. “As cross-border trade and interconnected supply chains continue to expand, growing uncertainties are placing a strain on the global economy and trade landscape.”

Beyond APEC’s loftier goals, participants in Jeju will be keen on knowing more about the US-China tariff truce, in which China’s use of retaliation appears to have paid off, and how the outcome may affect other nation’s negotiations with Washington.

Details of the latest Greer-Li talks on Thursday were not immediately available and the US Embassy in Seoul declined a request to confirm the meeting.

Securing Greer’s presence at the meeting was a key goal of Seoul, according to Trade Minister Cheong.

“For other ministers and countries, too, whether Greer was coming was their biggest question. When it was confirmed Greer was coming, quite a number of countries changed their representative from vice ministers to ministers,” Cheong told reporters.

From the perspective of the US, Greer’s appearance may also keep in check China’s efforts to build support among other nations feeling the pressure from Trump’s policies.

“The US can use this opportunity to continue ongoing trade talks with China, Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Vietnam and most of member countries,” said Yeo at the Peterson Institute. “It was vindicated that China doesn’t have to rush for a deal. China may use this momentum to strengthen its narratives that China is a leader in regional trade integration at the APEC.”

South Korea and Japan, which rely on the US for security, have avoided any hint of retaliation. While the two US allies were among the first to start talks with the US, political uncertainty ahead of a presidential election is putting the brakes on Seoul’s efforts to reach a deal. South Korea’s Industry Minister Ahn Duk-geun, a key official in Seoul’s trade talks with the US, is set to meet Greer on Friday while Cheong met China’s Li on Thursday.

In contrast, Japan is likely to miss a bilateral talk with Greer after sending only lower ranking officials to APEC, a possible indication that Tokyo prefers to take more time to get a better deal.

With all the focus on individual bilateral deals, the ultimate goal of APEC may be falling by the wayside for now.

“Though some APEC trade ministers may try to shore up support for the multilateral trading system at these meetings, they will be swimming against the tide,” Eurasia Group’s Boling said.

--With assistance from Fran Wang and James Mayger.

(Adds details of meeting between Greer and Li. An earlier version of this story corrected the name of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation.)