Asia-Pacific leaders vow to remove investment barriers

2015 APEC meet in Ph

VLADIVOSTOK, Russia — The 20th Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Economic Leaders’ Meeting ended on Sunday with the formal announcement that the Philippines will host the APEC Summit in 2015.

The Philippines will host the summit after Indonesia and China.

“We welcome the offer of the People’s Republic of China, the Philippines, and Peru to host APEC in 2014, 2015, and 2016 respectively,” the 2012 Vladivostok Leaders’ Declaration stated.

“We welcome the invitation from the President of Indonesia to meet again in Bali in 2013,” it added.

In the declaration, leaders of the 21 APEC member agreed to end by 2015 raising new barriers to investment as well as trade in goods and services, imposing new export restrictions, or implementing World Trade Organization (WTO)-consistent measures with a significant protectionist effect following the concerns of member economies on increasing protectionism amid the global economic downturn.

“We reaffirm our commitment to rollback protectionist measures and continue maximum restraint in implementing WTO-consistent measures with a significant protectionist effect,” the Declaration stated, as leaders encouraged strengthened monitoring against protectionist measures.

“We recognize the importance of addressing unnecessary barriers to trade by advancing regulatory convergence and coherence to achieving our shared objectives of strengthening regional economic integration and ensuring product safety, supply chain integrity, and environmental protection,” it added.

Based on the Vladivostok Declaration, applied tariff rates will be reduced to a maximum of five percent on environmental goods by the end of 2015.

“By reducing tariffs on environmental goods, we will help our businesses and citizens to access important environmental technologies, which will facilitate their deployment, and use contributing significantly to our green growth and trade liberalization objectives,” the Declaration stated.

In the area of food security, leaders of the APEC member economies reaffirmed its commitment towards a 10 percent improvement in supply-chain performance by 2015, in terms of reduction of time, cost, and uncertainty of moving goods and services through the Asia-Pacific region.

The environment was also given focus in the Vladivostok Declaration as leaders expressed concern on trafficking of endangered and protected wildlife species. The leaders committed to further strengthen efforts in combating illegal trade of environmental resources.

The Declaration also made mention of the member economies’ commitment to further strengthen drive against terrorism; improve travel and tourism as a source of job creation; and improve disaster mitigation.

Overall trade of APEC member economies has grown four times since its first Leaders’ Meeting in Seattle, USA in 1993 while foreign direct investment (FDI) has an annual rate of more than 20 percent.

“We recognize that robust international trade, investment, and economic integration are key drivers of strong, sustainable, and balanced growth. With all APEC economies now being members of the World Trade Organization (WTO), we strongly reaffirm our commitment to trade and investment liberalization and facilitation in the Asia-Pacific region,” the declaration stated.

Member-economies expressed their commitment to work collectively to “support growth and foster financial stability, and restore confidence” amid the global economic downturn.

“We strongly commit to fight against corruption to ensure openness and transparency in APEC. Acknowledging that corruption fuels illicit trade and insecurity and is a tremendous barrier to economic growth, the safety of citizens, and to the strengthening of economic and investment cooperation among APEC economies, we endorse commitments on fighting corruption and ensuring transparency,” the declaration stated.

Established in 1989, the APEC has 21 member economies that aim to further enhance economic growth and prosperity for the region.

Making up the APEC are Australia, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, Republic of Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Peru, Philippines, Russia, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand United States of America, and Vietnam. –MADEL R. SABATER, Manila Bulletin