ASEAN ministers told to act quickly on any crisis signs
ASEAN ministers told to act quickly on any crisis signs
SINGAPORE (AFP): ASEAN finance ministers will have to act
swiftly on feedback received from the group's surveillance system
devised to prevent a repetition of the regional financial crisis,
a top official said Thursday.
The surveillance system, housed in the Jakarta-based
Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) secretariat and
supported primarily by the Asian Development Bank, will be based
on first-hand data gathered from ASEAN economies and analyzed by
experts.
"It depends on the ability of the finance ministers on how
effectively they apply peer pressure" and act decisively on the
data, ASEAN Secretary-General Rodolfo Severino told a meeting of
the ASEAN Business Forum.
The forum comprises the cream of the region's business
community to promote intra-ASEAN networking.
Severino said that although ASEAN worked on the principle of
consensus, he hoped that member governments recognized how
important it was to respond quickly to economic problems before
they grew out of control.
"I hope they have learned the lesson ... there is no mechanism
which can force governments to do what they don't want to do but
regional action can help encourage and support governments to
keep to their understanding which they have given to one
another," he said.
Severino said the contagion effect of the regional financial
crisis which erupted in mid-1997 with the devaluation of the Thai
baht demonstrated that "economic troubles of one country is the
economic troubles of all."
ASEAN comprises Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia,
Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
Severino said that "of top importance" in ASEAN's response to
the challenges of financial upheaval and globalization had been
its decision not only to persist in regional economic integration
but to accelerate it.
ASEAN is presently embarking on a free trade plan under which
by 2002 the products of the grouping's key economies will be
subject to maximum tariffs of five percent.