ASEAN shelves idea of freeing trade faster

ASEAN shelves idea of freeing trade faster

BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN (AFP): The Association of Southeast Asian
Nations (ASEAN) decided yesterday to put in cold storage a
proposal to speed up the creation of a regional free trade area
by 2000, officials said.

Economic Ministers of the seven-nation grouping made the
decision at a meeting of the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA)
Council, the body charged with steering the region towards
tariff-free trade.

Singapore's Trade and Industry Minister Yeo Cheow Tong told
reporters after the meeting that ASEAN had agreed "to explore how
to accelerate AFTA at future meetings."

ASEAN comprises Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines,
Singapore, Thailand and newcomer Vietnam.

Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah of Brunei in July urged ASEAN to
advance the deadline for AFTA to 2000, three years ahead of the
target year 2003 set by the regional grouping.

The sultan had warned that other regions were overtaking ASEAN
in economic cooperation and were liberalizing their markets to
attract investment, saying the grouping must "respond to this
competition."

The AFTA council meeting yesterday also endorsed the inclusion
of unprocessed agricultural products into the Common Effective
Preferential Tariffs (CEPT) scheme, the mechanism that allows
gradual tariff-slashing until the goal of a free trade area is
achieved.

Nearly 1,358 tariff lines representing 68 percent of all
unprocessed agricultural items are to be included into the CEPT
scheme by Jan. 1,1996, officials said.

Another 402 tariff lines representing 20 percent of
unprocessed agricultural products would be included within the
next seven years while the remainder are to be subject to a
special arrangement which was not spelt out.