Speeding up AFTA

Last week the foreign ministers of the seven ASEAN countries met in a routine annual meeting in Brunei Darussalam. One of the economic issues that was brought up was a proposal from the host country to speed up the establishment of AFTA (ASEAN Free Trade Area) and move it from 2003, as initially planned, to the year 2000.

The various views published in the media indicate that the objections to the proposal made by the Sultan of Brunei are not strong enough. The impression is that an earlier establishment of AFTA will benefit us. It would not only provide our national business world with a concrete training ground, it would also prompt us into finishing our homework of resolving the problems that still encumber our national economy.

Nevertheless, we will be better able to control the different variables when competing in a limited environment. We would also have the influence to discuss the relevant matters whenever we feel that the negative free trade impacts become too heavy for our national economy to bear. Things will be entirely different once we have to confront the global market, in which there will certainly be a good deal more players than just the seven member countries of ASEAN.

We tend to concur with such a view since we are well aware of the problems and challenges we are facing. We have an interest in the immediate elimination of all the obstacles that are in the way of the market mechanism.

-- Kompas, Jakarta