Ministers urge anti-dumping measures in Asia-Pacific

Ministers urge anti-dumping measures in Asia-Pacific

JAKARTA (JP): Australian Foreign Minister Gareth Evans and
Chilean Minister of the Economy Alvaro Garcia Hurtado want action
to end dumping practices in the Asia-Pacific region.

Evans and Garcia told a business symposium held on the
sideline of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meetings
that dumping practices in the region hurt the efforts to
harmonize policies on fair business competition in the region.

"We (APEC member economies) need to harmonize actual
competition policy in the region in an Australia-New Zealand
way," Evans told participants of the symposium organized by the
Pacific Basin Economic Council at the Sahid Jaya Hotel.

APEC's Eminent Persons Group alleged that abuses of anti-
dumping policies are a source of widespread concern and potential
barriers to trade flow among the member economies.

APEC's 18 member economies deal with dumping practices in
different ways. Some have established anti-dumping and anti-trust
policies. Others do not even have proper laws or are just
beginning to make them.

The eminent persons group recommended that APEC create a task
force on anti-dumping and restrictive business practices to
facilitate the implementation of free trade among member
economies.

Stressing the need for anti-dumping policies in APEC
countries, Garcia said, "Asia-Pacific countries should have
transparent mechanisms to eliminate unfair competition. This will
give stimulus to investment in the sphere."

Evans said the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) has,
since its inception five years ago, rapidly been transformed from
a loose consultative forum into a negotiating one.

APEC, which was first floated by then Australian Prime
Minister Bob Hawk in Canberra in 1989, has steadily made
"fascinating" progress, he said.

It began with an OECD (Organization of Economic Cooperation
and Development) style, mostly for dialog, technical cooperation,
some degree of business support, economic cooperation in a looser
sense, data compilation, policy dialog and technical cooperation,
he said.

"At the present stage, specific agreements are being
negotiated between member countries to produce cost-saving
movements towards specifically targeted businesses, such as
standard testing procedures," he said.

Poised

In his speech entitled The Benefits of Open Markets for the
Asia-Pacific Region, Evans said that APEC members now assembled
in Jakarta were poised for an "historic opportunity" to make the
forum fully institutionalized.

He said that in the past, it would have been difficult for a
developing country like Indonesia to embrace the concept of free
trade.

Speaking on the domestic problems constraining the goal of
free trade, Garcia said Chile, like many other economies, was
convinced that opening trade was the best way to speed up growth.

He said that countries which had open their markets grew twice
as fast as those which applied protectionism. Chile, he said, has
grown impressively since it opened its markets 20 years ago.
(pan)