Asia, Latin America seek increased investment and trade relations

Asia, Latin America seek increased investment and trade relations

Cecil Morella, Agence France-Presse, Manila

Foreign ministers and senior officials of 32 Asian and Latin American countries will meet in the Philippines later this week to improve ties between the mainly developing economies of the two regions.

The Jan. 29-31 meeting includes first world countries Japan, Australia and South Korea plus emerging powerhouse China, but unlike other Pacific rim gatherings excludes the United States, the main trading partner of many of the countries.

Filipino Foreign Secretary Delia Albert said the Forum for East Asia-Latin America Cooperation (FEALAC) plans to draft a plan of action to set the group's direction for the next few years.

The ministers will discuss ways to cooperate over their economies, trade, education, science and technology, she added.

Cross-Pacific links once blossomed from galleon trade between Mexico and China through the Philippines, but since then trade and other contact have been at a relatively low level.

Philippine history books say the galleon trade lasted from 1565 to 1815.

With North America, Western Europe and Japan taking the bulk of their exports, developing Asian countries shipped less than three percent of their products to South America in 2002, Asian Development Bank figures show.

"Trade and investment in the two regions have not been at a higher level as we would like it to be," said George Reyes, spokesman for the Manila meeting.

Asia, with the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) at the core, has been promoting economic and security issues with other regions, including the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum that includes the United States, Canada and the European Union.

The efforts have resulted in the Asian Regional Forum that discusses security issues in the region with global powers, ASEAN plus Three that draws China, South Korea and Japan, as well as the fairly new Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM).

An Asian diplomat told AFP "it is a question of time before the (Asia-Latin America) meeting takes a higher profile, and my gut feeling is that this is going to evolve like ASEM."

ASEM first evolved at the ministerial level in the mid-1990s and holds summits every other year.

The FEALAC forum was first conceived by Singapore Prime Minister Goh Chok Thong and Chilean leader Eduardo Frei in 1998, and Chile hosted its first ministerial meeting in 2001.

"Most of the FEALAC members are developing countries, so we have a lot in common," Reyes said.

"We face basically the same problems -- access to financing, inadequate infrastructure, lack of information for the small and medium-scale enterprises. They don't know what market to develop."

He said the members hope improved links would lead to long term political influence on the world stage.

On the Asian side the forum groups ASEAN members Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam along with Australia, China, Japan, South Korea, and New Zealand.

The Latin American countries involved are Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Chile, Ecuador, El Salvador, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay and Venezuela.

Guatemala and Nicaragua would be brought into the group at the Manila meeting.