India-ASEAN trade ties

India-ASEAN trade ties

NEW DELHI (AFP): ASEAN and India have decided to step up
cooperation and trade which has been described as falling short
of its potential, officials said here.

Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) secretary
general Ajit Singh told Indian Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao
during a meeting that ways to boost business ties and technology
transfers would have to be explored further, they said.

Singh, who was leading a 40-member team from ASEAN member-
countries, said over the weekend that there were vast
possibilities in "banking, investment and tourism," following New
Delhi's 1991 economic reforms which unshackled quasi-socialistic
curbs.

Rao told Singh that impediments to trade and capital flows
between India and the ASEAN -- grouping Brunei, India, Indonesia,
Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand -- would be
ironed out.

Trade between India and ASEAN increased 13 percent from 1990
to about US$2.5 billion in 1993. India's exports doubled to $1.5
billion and imports from ASEAN declined 32 percent to $991
million.