ASEAN vows to speed up cooperation
ASEAN vows to speed up cooperation
PHUKET, Thailand (Reuter): Economic ministers from the six- member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) promised yesterday to speed up industrial cooperation and eliminate barriers to trade in the region.
"In view of the increasingly competitive global economy and the rapid industrialization process in ASEAN, the ministers agreed there is a need to look into new activities and/or schemes to accelerate industrial cooperation in ASEAN," they said in a statement.
The statement ended a two-day meeting on the Thai resort island of Phuket to review implementation of the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA), scheduled to come into effect by the year 2003. ASEAN groups Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, Brunei, Singapore and the Philippines.
AFTA will be implemented ahead of a free trade area among the 18-member Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum, which includes all ASEAN members and their two main trade partners, the United States and Japan, planned for the year 2020.
The ministers agreed to scrap a joint-venture program providing incentives for certain industries and a brand-to-brand complementation scheme for the car industry because they were too bureaucratic.
Thai Deputy Prime Minister Supachai Panitchpakdi told reporters late on Friday the two programs distorted the market.
He said an AFTA scheme to trim duties on a wide variety of products to a maximum of five percent by 2003 would be sufficient incentive for investors in the region.
A framework pact on liberalizing rules on services was also reached during the meeting, aimed at "realizing a free trade area in services in the long run", the statement said.
"This (patent and trademark system) will be a novelty to help secure the protection of ASEAN citizens," Supachai said.
ASEAN ministers said a consultative meeting with Australia and New Zealand on possible closer economic relations should be held during an ASEAN economic ministerial meeting scheduled for September, 1995.
The ministers, however, were stymied in trimming a list of unprocessed agricultural products.
ASEAN officials said they were toiling to remove more than 2,500 products currently covered by tariff barriers.
Under AFTA, each country will submit a list of industrial products and manufactures on which tariff barriers will be lowered to at least five percent by the year 2003.
Malaysia has submitted a list of more than 100 goods, the largest in ASEAN, on which it does not want tariff duties removed. Indonesia has the smallest number of products on that list with 27. The rest have listed 30 or 50.
The six countries want to boost intra-ASEAN trade, which currently stands at 18 percent of total trade in the region. Implementation of AFTA should boost it to 25 percent.