ASEAN ministers weigh broader economic integration

ASEAN ministers weigh broader economic integration

By Vithoon Amorn, Reuters

VIENTIANE, Sept 28 (Reuters) - Southeast Asian economies need to
accelerate their own intergration as well as improve links with bigger
Asian economies amid slowing regional growth and surging oil prices,
ASEAN ministers heard on Wednesday.

The annual economic ministers meeting of the Association of South East
Asian Nations (ASEAN) also reviewed an agreement reached last year for
the more advanced economies in the group to remove import tariffs for
products in 11 priority sectors by 2007, three years ahead of schedule.

"It is important for ASEAN to further increase their concerted efforts
to further deepen and broaden regional economic integration," said Lao
Prime Minister Bounnyang Vorachit in his opening address.

ASEAN, which groups of Thailand, Singapore, Indonesia, Vietnam, the
Philippines, Brunei, Laos, Myanmar, Malaysia and Cambodia, aims to
create a single market by 2020.

ASEAN members have also been moving to negotiate bilateral and regional
free trade pacts with China, Japan, South Korea, India, Australia, New
Zealand, and the United States.

Last November, ASEAN and Chinese leaders announced a plan to create a
free-trade zone for their combined population of 1.8 billion by 2010.

During 1993-2003, ASEAN exports to China nearly tripled while Chinese
exports to the group more than quadrupled, according to ASEAN data.

One difficulty for ASEAN is that a marked diversity in the development
of its members -- for example, Cambodia's annual per capita income in
2003 was $310 while Singapore's was $20,987 -- has limited the group's
acheivements mainly to economic matters.

"ASEAN has been quite successful in economic cooperation, especially in
areas like tariff cuts, but efforts to promote intra-investment or
trade in services have made much slower progress." said Somjai
Phagaphasvivat of Thammasat University in Bangkok.

"Due to different stages of development, participation in debates on
finance and services cooperation have invariably been confined to
Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand, the three more advanced members," he
said.


09/28/05 10:03 ET


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