ASEAN 'to accelerate' free trade links outside region
ASEAN 'to accelerate' free trade links outside region
SIEM REAP, Cambodia (AFP): Southeast Asian economic ministers agreed Thursday to accelerate efforts to expand free trade links with their northern and southern neighbors in order to protect themselves from the US-induced global slowdown.
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) ministers also unveiled a new scheme for wealthier ASEAN members to give trade preferences to poorer colleagues to reduce the wide economic disparity in the 10-nation regional bloc.
The ASEAN General System of Preference scheme however will have to be negotiated on a bilateral basis.
Thai Commerce Minister Adisai Bodharamik, who chaired the meeting, said these initiatives "reduce the risks to ASEAN of the looming global economic slowdown."
He said the ministers have formed a working group to negotiate with dialogue partners China, Japan and South Korea, as well as Australia and New Zealand on the possibility of enhancing economic links through more open trade.
"We realize that growth of economic links with our neighbors -- particularly in Northeast Asia -- is vital to our long-term growth and development," he told reporters.
The working group has already met with officials from China to study the implications of Beijing's entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO) and explore the possibility of an ASEAN-China Free Trade Area -- a potential market of 1.7 billion peopled.
ASEAN is also discussing with Japan about the formation of a body of experts to study the setting up of a similar free trade arrangement with Tokyo, which is currently negotiating a free trade agreement with Singapore.
The working group is scheduled to meet with senior officials from Australia and New Zealand "to finalize the parameters of the closer economic partnership between the two regions," Adisai said.
On Friday, the ASEAN ministers will meet with Chinese Minister for Trade and Economic Cooperation Shi Guangsheng and South Korean Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Hwang Doo-yun as well as with a representative from Japan.
The meetings are under the ASEAN plus three dialogue process.
In a speech opening the meeting earlier Thursday, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen said the gathering was being held at a crucial juncture as ASEAN's export-driven economies reel from the impact of the slowdown in the US and Japanese economies and the downturn in the global electronics sector.
While Southeast Asian economies have recovered from the financial crisis in 1997 and 1998, "the global outlook for 2001 is becoming significantly more adverse," he said.
He asked the ministers to "discuss ways to sustain the recovery of ASEAN economies, to build up business and investor confidence and to mitigate the impact" of China's emergence as a formidable competitor once it joins the WTO.
Political troubles in the region, such as those gripping the Philippines and Indonesia, have driven investors to safer havens such as China and the emerging Indian market, analysts say.
ASEAN groups economic backwaters Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam with Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand.
To narrow the economic divide, the ministers agreed to increase trade between the poorer and richer ASEAN members through a System of General Preference.
Under this scheme, the six more developed members will agree to give trade preferences to their less developed neighbors, but such arrangements would only be undertaken on a bilateral basis.
The ministers also agreed to accelerate the implementation of an ambitious program to electronically link the 10 ASEAN member countries, including increased commercial transactions, through the Internet.