ASEAN countries forge ahead with borderless region plan
A'an Suryana The Jakarta Post Jakarta
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) countries concluded on Friday the eighth transportation ministers annual meeting in Jakarta, vowing to liberalize the movement of people and goods within the region.
At the end of the two-day meeting, the ministers produced a memorandum of understanding (MOU) on air freight services, which is dubbed as the first step toward the full liberalization of air freight services in the ASEAN region.
Indonesian Minister of Transportation Agum Gumelar said that the MOU allowed the designated airlines of each ASEAN member countries to operate all-cargo services up to 100 tons weekly with no limitations on frequency and aircraft types.
"The results of the meeting will ensure and accelerate mobility of people and goods within ASEAN countries, which could later on boost trade, investment and tourism in the region," Agum told a press conference here.
Also attending the press conference were ministers from other ASEAN countries, including others Ling Liong Sik from Malaysia, Hla Myint Swe from Myanmar, Zakaria Sulaiman from Brunei Darussalam and Yeo Cheow Tong from Singapore.
In their two-day meeting here, the ministers also agreed to simplify procedures on the movement of "dangerous goods" within the ASEAN member countries.
Meanwhile, an official at the Indonesian Ministry of Transportation acknowledged that in the past, procedures and requirements for the movement of dangerous goods within ASEAN were complicated, inhibiting the movement of such goods.
An example of goods categorized as dangerous are explosives.
So for the sake of accelerating the establishment of a free trade area, the procedures must be simplified, said Kalalo Nugroho, head of law and international cooperation at the ministry.
"It includes the scrapping of unnecessary documents," said Kalalo said.
However, the agreement could not be immediately implemented as the ASEAN countries still needed time to draft new regulations before the agreement takes effect.
The theme of this year's transportation ministers meeting is focused at facilitating an ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA) within the region.
AFTA was launched in January this year, with ASEAN founding nations like Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei Darussalam, Philippines, Singapore and Thailand lowering their tariffs on a wide range of products traded among them to below 3 percent.
This year's meeting was also the first meeting between ASEAN and China transport ministers. China was represented by its minister of communications, Huang Zhendong.
The involvement of China in this year's ASEAN transportation minister meeting was the follow-up of ASEAN and China Summit in Brunei in November 2001.
In the summit, ASEAN and China agreed to set up a free trade area within 10 years, which could give birth to a market of 1.8 billion consumers and create the largest free trade block in the world.
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