China-ASEAN trade up 41%

China-ASEAN trade up 41%

BEIJING (UPI): China's trade with Association of Southeast Asian Nations jumped 41 percent to reach a record US$19.48 billion in 1995, boosted by exports of steel and finished products, an official newspaper said yesterday.

For the first time China saw the balance of its exports to ASEAN countries shift from textiles, light industrial products, cereals and edible oils to steel, machinery and electronic products, Xie Ruixia, an official with the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation, told the China Daily.

China's primary imports were crude oil, grain, sugar and plywood, Xie said.

Southeast Asian nations for the first time last year became the No. 1 destination for Chinese labor and project engineering, supplanting the Middle East.

ASEAN countries led by Singapore pumped $1.7 billion into China in the first nine months of 1995, a figure analysts expect will grow as more Southeast Asian companies relocate labor- intensive industries to either China or Indonesia.

Xie attributed the trade boon to "political stability and a better investment environment" and pledged China would adhere to the "Five Principles of Peaceful Co-existence," outlining China's stance on state-to-state relations with its neighbors in the region.

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

Tensions between China and ASEAN have eased since last year when the Philippines accused China of building naval support installations on Mishief Reef, part of the potentially oil-rich chain of atolls that make up the Spratly Islands in the South China Sea.

With investors looking to other emerging low-cost markets including China, leaders from ASEAN countries meeting in December vowed to speed up regional economic integration by liberalizing investment laws, hastening deregulation of their economies and speeding up improvements to overstretched power supplies, transportation and communications.

The process is expected to accelerate as the group heads toward a Southeast Asian free-trade zone of more than 450 million people.