ASEAN finance ministers see regional growth

ASEAN finance ministers see regional growth

Agence France-Presse, Yangon

Southeast Asian finance ministers on Saturday said they expected the region to grow at 3.5-4.0 percent this year, bolstered by global recovery and efforts to integrate member nations' economies.

At the conclusion of their annual meeting, held in the Myanmar capital for the first time, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) ministers said their "sound macroeconomic policies" would also have a positive effect.

"We are confident that, after registering moderate growth in 2001, the ASEAN economies will grow more strongly at 3.5-4.0 percent this year," they said in a joint statement.

"This is based on the projected recovery of the global economy, our sound domestic macroeconomic policies and ongoing structural reforms, and the closer economic cooperation that ASEAN has fostered."

The ministers said that the global slowdown, exacerbated by the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, had hampered the grouping's efforts to sustain economic recovery in the wake of the 1997-98 financial crisis.

"External demand, particularly the demand for electronic goods, which has underpinned strong export growth in our economies since 1999, slowed significantly," they said.

That factor, together with a general decline in foreign direct investment, resulted in modest growth of 2.8 percent for ASEAN countries in 2001, they said.

ASEAN has identified economic integration and cooperation as being key to competing in the tough new competitive environment.

At their two-day meeting, the 10 ministers looked at strategies to achieve integration, a task they were charged with at the grouping's summit last November.

"After the summit in Brunei it is necessary for the various economic sectors, including finance, to have a look at what we should do to follow up the decisions made there," ASEAN deputy secretary-general Tran Duch Minh said earlier this week.

"And at the last summit we were instructed by the ASEAN leaders to come up with a roadmap for economic integration."