APEC urged to focus on trade liberalization
JAKARTA (JP): Chile, APEC's latest member nation, asked the forum yesterday to focus its work on trade liberalization.
"We prefer a fast pace of integration and economic liberalization in APEC, "Chile's Economics Minister Alvaro Garcia Hurtado told an open forum on the future direction of APEC.
Hurtado said his country is ready to meet the faster timetable for free and open trade by 2010 as proposed by the Pacific Business Froum.
But he acknowledged, though, that it is difficult for all APEC members to go along at the same pace due to the different stages of their economic development.
Speaking about the nature of free trade in the region, Hurtado said it is essential for APEC to base its trade liberalization process on individual, unilateral openings and not through preferential arrangements, compulsory approaches or through strict common binding regulations.
But he reaffirmed the urgency for APEC to define a flexible but clear framework with both a starting point and a final deadline to reach free trade in the region.
"The longer we take to implement this process, the greater the risk for the emergence of managed trade schemes or preferential sub-regional agreements, thus frustrating and weakening the goals of APEC," Hurtado cautioned.
Issues
Speaking at the same forum, South Korean Foreign Minister Han Sung-joo identified four issues that would affect the future of APEC.
The issues are related to the harmonization of globalism and regionalism in trade, the balancing of gradualism and activism, equilibrium between depth and breadth and the synchronization of the different processes of economic regionalism, Han added.
"Since APEC members represent about half of the world's output and about as much of the global trade, it has a great stake in promoting a global free trade regime," Han told the forum.
The forum, held under the central theme APEC: Where do we go from here was organized by the Indonesian National Committee for the Pacific Economic Cooperation Council and the Centre for Strategic and International Studies to generate vigorous discourses on the future direction of the forum in conjunction with the APEC leaders meeting at Bogor today.
Han stressed the importance of APEC adopting open regionalism and the need for its free trade principles to conform with the global multilateral trade system under the GATT/World Trade Organization.
"East Asia has not formed an economic bloc of its own but it is considered to be by far the most dynamic economic area in the world," he said, arguing against exclusive regional free trade.
Han cautioned that APEC should also be able to strike a balance between activism and gradualism.
"If we opt for gradualism, we may miss the opportunity to act decisively," he pointed out.
But he acknowledged that the divergent stages of economic development of APEC members also tend to lean the forum towards the road of gradualism.
He also saw the equilibrium between depth and breadth with regard to membership as critical to APEC's future.
In addition, when the moratorium on new membership expires within two years, as was decided in Seattle, APEC should look into the question as to whether membership should be based on geographical location and economic linkages.
"It seems to me that the answer is to be found in the equilibrium between depth and breadth," Han added. (vin)