ASEAN CCI want active private sectors
JAKARTA (JP): The ASEAN Chambers of Commerce and Industry (ASEAN CCI) has called on private sectors to be more active in influencing their governments to establish an integrated economy in Southeast Asia.
The president of ASEAN CCI, Aburizal Bakrie, said yesterday at the chamber's four-day annual meeting that stronger regional economic integration was needed because of rapid global economic changes and the region's dynamism.
"The ASEAN economy is continuously awakening to its new glorious era as part of the Asia-Pacific's economic vitality," he said.
ASEAN groups Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam. Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar are expected to join this year.
Aburizal said the group must increase intra-ASEAN trade and investment to accelerate the realization of economic integration and to strengthen ASEAN's sense of community.
He said ASEAN CCI had to apply multilateral approaches in addition to regional approaches to avoid one-sided trade and investment.
He said more effective, nonjudgmental public decisions which were in business community's and society's best interests needed to be made.
Aburizal also encouraged private sectors to aggressively seek foreign direct investment and non-ASEAN businesses to participate in the ASEAN economy, in order to integrate ASEAN in the global market.
"But we do not want our market to be dictated and intimidated by others," he said.
ASEAN's secretary-general, Setyanto P. Santosa, called on Indonesia to create a more favorable climate for business because ASEAN free trade was approaching.
ASEAN, under the ASEAN Free Trade Area agreement (AFTA), is committed to free trade by 2003 under a common effective preferential tariff scheme.
Setyanto said improvements must be made in all sections of government and businesses to prepare for AFTA.
Indonesia's annual export growth for 1995-1996 of between 13 and 14 percent was still much lower than other ASEAN nations like the Philippines where exports rose between 60 and 70 percent over the same period, he said.
Several forms of partnership between ASEAN countries were proposed at yesterday's meeting, including cooperation in the tourism and telecommunications industries.
ASEAN CCI's chairman for infrastructure and tourism, Dolf Latumahina, said agreements were made between Indonesia and Singapore and other countries to promote Indonesia's eastern islands for tourism.
Other proposals included cooperation in the cellular telephone industry to standardize the cost of telephone services, Dolf said. (02)