APEC agenda still vague

APEC agenda still vague

Two years after setting its lofty goal of lifting all trade
and investment barriers by 2020, a group of 18 Asia-Pacific
economies is facing the toughest test yet of its free-trade
mettle.

After talking about grand plans for a virtually borderless
economy from North America to Southeast Asia, members of the Asia
Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum are to submit detailed
plans Sunday on implementing that vision, beginning Jan 1.

This should be the most concrete step to date for APEC
members. It represents one more kilometer in a journey that began
in 1993 in Seattle, the United States, with the vision of an
Asia-Pacific community.

In 1994, the sojourn led to Bogor, Indonesia, where the
leaders set the 2020 deadline for free trade. The following year
in Osaka, Japan saw an agreement on an action plan.

Extracting from its members bold schedules in reducing tariff
rates and opening markets has not been easy, especially since the
process is voluntary, and coincided with elections in countries
like the United States and Thailand.

Thus, Philippine President Fidel Ramos, host of this year's
APEC meetings, sent out letters last week to 17 fellow leaders
asking them to make substantial commitments to open markets in a
bid to ensure the meeting does not remain an annual talkfest.

He wants APEC members to present bold tariff reduction plans
or individual action plans, to be collectively called the "Manila
Action Plan For APEC 1996".

"This will serve as APEC's road map to the 21st century,"
Ramos said. However, the challenge does not lie only in the free-
trade momentum, which businessmen would like to speed up and
activists say is already proceeding at too fast a pace.

The seven-year-old APEC faces growing pressure to go beyond
trade and investment as its driving force, and to heed the
concerns of developing countries undergoing free-trade pains.

The tug-of-war over APEC's future direction is due in part to
a membership that includes developed and developing economies
with different state policies. APEC has 40 percent of the world's
population, accounts for 56 percent of world production and 46
percent of merchandise trade.

Buffeted by different -- at times, conflicting -- pressures,
APEC's agenda and identity are far from complete at this point.
Debates about its priorities and pace show that many questions
remain unresolved, and will likely remain so for some time yet.

-- The Nation, Bangkok