Ministers from the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) countries held their 21st meeting on November 11-12 in Singapore. Their discussions centered on the progress made towards regional integration and the promotion of free and open trade and investment.
In the joint statement issued after the meeting, the ministers said they remain concerned over the threat of protectionism to economic recovery. They reaffirmed “the concrete commitments undertaken at the Singapore Meeting of Ministers Responsible for Trade in July 2009 to keep our markets open and resist all forms of protectionism, including the extension of our commitment to refrain from raising new barriers to investments or to trade in goods and services to the end of 2010, and beyond if necessary.”
“We are pleased that the APEC region as a whole has remained relatively open to trade throughout the global crisis,” they added. “We recognize the need to calibrate overall policy settings, including temporary support measures, to the pace of recovery and improvement in the global economy. We will continue to undertake regular review of our policies that impact on trade and investment, and reiterate our pledge to maintain free and open markets.”
Specifically, the ministers reaffirmed “APEC's commitment to the Bogor Goals of free and open trade and investment. APEC will work towards reducing barriers not only within APEC, but also with other non-APEC economies.” And, in addition, they would “welcome work to continue to explore building blocks towards a possible Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific (FTAAP).”
They requested further studies “which illustrated the possible economic benefits and challenges of establishing an FTAAP; the updated inventory of issues that would need to be addressed as part of a preparatory process for a possible FTAAP including, inter-alia, the possible pathways to an FTAAP; and the expansion of the study on identifying convergences and divergences in APEC's regional and bilateral trade agreements to cover additional agreements and chapters.”
APEC officials have been asked to take forward this work by exploring a range of possible pathways to achieve FTAAP and provide a progress update to their next annual meeting.
They also welcomed “the steps taken by officials to promote greater convergence in the areas of rules of origin and services. They instructed officials “to widen their work to promote convergence on other core FTA chapters, including investment, trade facilitation, and standards.
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