ASEAN trade up in 2002, shows signs of continued expansion

ASEAN trade up in 2002, shows signs of continued expansion

Agence France-Presse
Phnom Penh

Total trade in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations
(ASEAN) expanded slightly in 2002, but shows signs of picking up
this year, economic ministers from the 10-nation bloc said
Monday.

Total ASEAN trade grew 2.75 percent year-on-year to US$706
billion last year, with the United States, Japan, the European
Union and China as its top trading partners, they said.

"Trade ministers were pleased to note that this trend
continued up to the first quarter of 2003," the ministers said in
a joint statement after an ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA) Council
meeting in the Cambodian capital.

It said total trade for the January to March period rose 15.29
percent year-on-year to $186.25 billion.

Intra-ASEAN trade, meanwhile, grew 4.82 percent to $159.46
billion in the same period. Trade among the 10 members of the
organization in the first quarter of the year to March was up
5.77 percent to $39.90 billion.

ASEAN groups Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia,
Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.

The AFTA council meeting was part of related meetings to the
ASEAN Economic Ministers meeting being held this week here. The
ministers are expected to speed up the creation of a regional
single market dubbed the "ASEAN economic community."

The economic community may take the form of an enlarged free
trade area with zero intra-regional tariffs, where labor and
capital can also move freely.

ASEAN is already implementing a free trade area in which
senior members Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines,
Singapore and Thailand will totally abolish tariffs for intra-
regional trade by 2010.

Newer members Cambodia , Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam are to
dismantle their tariffs 10 years later.

Already 99.6 percent of products have already been knocked
down since that was launched in 1992. It is expected that only
0.50 percent of all products traded in the region would remain
with above five percent tariff this year.

The average common effective preferential tariff for the six
senior ASEAN members has gone down to 2.39 percent this year, the
ministers said.