Business summit a sign of Asian, African confidence

Business summit a sign of Asian, African confidence

Zakki P. Hakim and Urip Hudiono, The Jakarta Post/Jakarta

Confidence is high that the Asian-African Summit will result in
a new strategic partnership for the nations involved. The signs
of it were in the air after the Asian-African Business Summit
concluded on a high note on Friday with the signing of a joint
declaration to strengthen business and economic ties between the
two continents.

South African President Thabo Mbeki, who officially closed the
summit, expressed his confidence that it would succeed in its
goal of creating a stronger alliance between Asian and African
countries.

"The talks at the summit are going very well, and there is a
strong commitment to forming a strategic partnership. And here at
the Business Summit, the same spirit prevails," he said,
referring to the summit's joint declaration.

Mbeki said he expected the declaration to reinforce in a
practical way the business and economic relations between Asian and
African nations so that they can help one another with each
other's development, not just by looking to the developed
countries in the North, but also by cooperating with one another
as developing countries in the South.

Meanwhile, Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi called on
Asian and African countries to be more comprehensive in
establishing economic partnerships, incorporating mutual
cooperation in such socioeconomic areas as human resources
development, apart from simply entering into free trade
agreements (FTA).

Information exchange was also a crucial issue in the
partnerships, Koizumi pointed out in his keynote address, as the
lack of this had been among the major obstacles to promoting
trade and investment between Asia and Africa.

To remedy this situation, Japan would establish an online
business information exchange network under the Tokyo
International Conference on African Development (TICAD)
initiative, which it has been pursuing in cooperation with the
United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and the United Nations
Industrial Development Organization, he said.

"This network will provide relevant information on businesses
in Asia and Africa via the Internet, which will hopefully
contribute further to the development of trade and investment
relations between the two regions," Koizumi said.

Earlier, Nippon Keidanren (Japan Business Federation) Vice
Chairman Hiromasa Yonekura said that the low level of Japanese
investment in Africa stemmed from the perception that Africa was
geographically remote and a lack of information on African
countries.

In addition, he said that international firms tended to seek
out regions and countries that offered political stability,
security, solid infrastructure, as well as trained and
enthusiastic workers.

"It is my personal wish that Japanese private sector companies
that have been operating in Asia would contribute to building
infrastructure in host countries in Africa," said Yonekura, who
is also the president of Sumitomo Chemical Co.

He said that it would be useful to implement realistic and
substantive regional free trade zones within the African region
in order to provide the minimum market size to capture foreign
investment.

To strengthen economic ties with Asian countries, Nippon
Keidanren has submitted a policy recommendation to the Japanese
government to conclude economic partnership agreements with other
Asian countries, which would eventually lead to an East Asia Free
Trade Zone, Yonekura said.

Leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)
called on countries in the region to strengthen their economic
cooperation in the energy and trade sectors.

In the energy sector, Philippines President Gloria Macapagal
Arroyo warned how the recent surge in global oil prices could
particularly hurt economies in Asia and Africa, given the fact
that many of them were oil importers.

"The trend could worsen, halting the economic growth of Asian
and African countries, stripping our competitiveness and our
pursuit of development programs. This could increase poverty and
widen the gap between the rich and the poor, which is a toxic
formula for more global terrorism," she said.

"I therefore call on the Asian-African Summit to do its share
in pushing for greater stability in oil prices. I call on world
leaders, including the petroleum exporting countries of Asia and
Africa, to offer solutions that will temper the volatility of
crude oil prices."

Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong called on the two
regions to improve the competitiveness of their economies and to
embrace the era of globalization. They could benefit from the
city state's experience of establishing free trade agreements
(FTA).

Referring to Singapore's recent FTA with Panama, Lee vowed to
expand his country's free trade with other countries,
particularly in Asia and Africa.

"We have not had an FTA with any African nation," he said,
"but perhaps with the revival of the Bandung Spirit and the
strengthening of ties between Asia and Africa, that will change
in the not too distant future."