ASEAN moves AFTA five years ahead of schedule

ASEAN moves AFTA five years ahead of schedule

BANGKOK (AFP): Economy ministers of the Association of
Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) said yesterday they would enact a
comprehensive trade tariff agreement by 2003, five years ahead of
schedule, Thai television reported.

The ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA), which requires preferential
tariffs of zero to five percent for trade between ASEAN-member
countries, was also expanded to cover unprocessed agricultural
products, state-run Channel 7 reported.

The decision, made at the annual economic ministers gathering
in the northern Thai province of Chiang Mai, has been hinted at
for nearly a year.

The original purpose of the anti-protectionist agreement,
launched in January 1993, was to ensure low tariffs on
manufactured goods in the combined ASEAN market of some 320
million people.

But ASEAN officials, surprised by the rapid growth of their
own economies and the proliferation of trading blocs, including
the APEC (Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation) forum, have
questioned the 15-year deadline originally set to meet the new
tariff rates.

The accelerated agreement will cover 15 categories of
manufactured goods including textiles, petrochemicals, plastics
and electronics, the report said.

Goods currently taxed 20 percent or less are to reach the
below-five-percent goal within five years, it said.

Goods taxed more than 20 percent are to wait seven years
before the new rates are in place, it said.

Other goods which are already moving towards the new
regulations through normal tax adjustments will have 10 years to
reach their goal, it said.

Significantly, the ministers added unprocessed agricultural
goods to the roster, including rice, vegetables, fruit, cassava
and coffee, the report said without adding further details.

The ASEAN economies comprise the world's largest exporters of
several agricultural products, including rice and cassava.

ASEAN groups Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines,
Singapore and Thailand.

Property rights

Meanwhile, a Commerce Ministry official said here that the
ASEAN economic ministers will draft an agreement this week to
protect intellectual property.

The landmark agreement, which would be the first of its kinds
in Southeast Asia, would likely be sealed during the 1995 ASEAN
summit in Bangkok, he said.

Protecting copyright on everything from music to T-shirts has
become an urgent trade issue for ASEAN. Its economic ministers
are attending an annual meeting in the northern Thai province of
Chiang Mai this week.

Developing nation members of the General Agreement on Tariffs
and Trade (GATT) have five years to meet the body's mutual
copyright protection guidelines.

The draft agreement for ASEAN could be an interim step toward
meeting the GATT goal, the official said.

The agreement is expected to borrow from other conventions,
such as the Paris Union, the Berne Convention and the World
Intellectual Property Rights Organization, he said.

Several ASEAN members already belong to international
copyright conventions.

Thailand, Malaysia and the Philippines are members of the
Berne Convention on artistic works. The Philippines and Indonesia
have entered the Paris Union for industrial patents and
trademarks.

But Western countries have charged that enforcement of
copyrights has been lax and uncoordinated.

Thailand, for instance, has been on a U.S. Priority Watch List
for failure to protect copyrights of films and music.

The head of the intellectual property rights division of the
Thai Commerce Ministry told reporters yesterday that the problem
was as much a domestic one as international, with most Thais not
knowing they could register their own ideas for patents and
protection.