ASEAN cuts deeper into trade barriers
ASEAN cuts deeper into trade barriers
PHUKET, Thailand (AFP): The Association of Southeast Asian
Nations (ASEAN) is several steps closer to forming an integrated
market of more than 500 million people following trade and
investment talks here.
Trade ministers and investment chiefs from around the region
said that under new targets of economic liberalisation, most of
ASEAN's nine members would be fully integrated by 2003.
"Instead of New York, Los Angeles, Detroit and Chicago you
will have Manila, Jakarta, Singapore and Bangkok -- an integrated
market of more than 500 million people," Philippine Trade and
Industry Secretary Jose Pardo said.
"We have all agreed to begin stepping up efforts to respond to
the challenges of globalization," he said.
An informal meeting of ASEAN economic ministers on this
holiday island in southern Thailand on Saturday approved a
deepening of tariff cuts with a view to eliminating charges on
most imported goods before 2002.
Ministers said that by then most products traded within the
region would incur no tariffs at all.
Barriers to foreign investment in manufacturing, agriculture
and fisheries are to be dismantled by 2003 under commitments made
at the first-ever formal meeting of the ASEAN Investment Area
Council here Friday.
The council said the deadline for 100-percent non-ASEAN
ownership of regional companies would also be brought forward to
send a clear message to the world that business was welcomed from
all sources.
"We are moving toward blurring the distinction between ASEAN
and non-ASEAN investors," ASEAN secretary-general Rodolfo
Severino said.
"When we start dismantling limits on investment most countries
agree it is just not practical to distinguish between ASEAN and
non-ASEAN members."
No date was set for the liberalisation of all non-ASEAN
investment.
Less-developed countries such as Laos and Vietnam have more
time to liberalize but are just as committed to the long-term
goal of an integrated regional market, officials said.
ASEAN groups Brunei, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the
Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. Cambodia is likely
to become the 10th member soon.
Countries which lag behind the scheduled tariff reduction will
be subject to "peer pressure" to keep up.
"We will not backtrack from this," Severino said. "It is a
peer pressure. The pressure here is the need for investments."
Delegates said ASEAN was determined to push ahead with its
liberalisation plans despite the economic crisis which has sent
many members into recession since 1997, the year the "Asian
economic miracle" ended.
They said that by the time their targets had been reached, the
region would be on its feet and heading into a new growth phase.
"The worst is behind us and the process of recovery has
begun," the Philippines' Pardo said.
"We are hoping that as we enter the new millennium ... higher
levels of growth can again happen in our part of the world."
Despite ASEAN's ambitious drive for an integrated market,
Severino said he doubted if the region would ever go as far as
the European Union with its single currency and common external
tariff.
"ASEAN is much less protectionist in agriculture than Europe,
even now," he said.
"The main difference between ASEAN and the EU is that we don't
have a common external tariff. Who would set the tariff and who
would administer it?"
ASEAN nations agreed in Hanoi last year to lower tariffs on
manufactured products to zero-5.0 percent by 2002 under the ASEAN
Free Trade Area (AFTA), a year ahead of earlier schedules.
They said that after Saturday's meeting, the consensus was to
eliminate tariffs as soon as possible and to reduce the number of
items currently exempted under AFTA.