ASEAN welcomes upgraded version of ACFTA

Econimic Ministers from the 10 ASEAN members have noted with appreciation with China' s proposal on building an upgraded version of the ASEAN-China Free Trade Area (ACFTA). saying that ASEAN "welcomed the intent for the overall enhancement of the ACFTA."

In a joint media statement issued here on Wednesday following the ASEAN and China's economic ministers' consultations, which was co-chaired by Pehin Dato Lim Jock Seng, second Minister of foreign Affairs and Trade of Brunei and Gao Hucheng, Minister of Commerce of China.

ACFTA, which was signed 10 years ago, has played a key role in promoting rapid economic development for both China and ASEAN, said Gao in an interview with Chinese reporters. He said in the current consultations, China proposed to further strengthen China- ASEAN industrial cooperation and build an upgraded version of ACFTA.

Reviewing the general performance of ASEAN-China bilateral trade and investments, the ministers noted with pleasure that China maintained its position as ASEAN's largest trading partner despite the uncertainty in the global economy.

ASEAN-China bilateral trade based on ASEAN statistics, expanded at an annual growth rate of 21.6 percent from 2009 to 2012.

By the end of 2012, ASEAN total trade with China reached 318.6 billion U.S. dollars, increasing by 13.6 percent from 280.4 billion in 2011. The ministers were confident that the goal set by the leaders to bring bilateral trade to 500 billion U.S. dollars by 2015 would be achieved, if the trend continues up to 2015.

The ministers noted the progress made in implementing the ACFTA and expressed satisfaction with the ACFTA Joint Committee's ongoing efforts in upgrading the ACFTA agreements to ensure that the ACFTA remains dynamic and commercially relevant.

The ministers underscored that, with the liberalization objectives of the ACFTA almost realized, at least for ASEAN-6 ( Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand)and China, efforts should now be directed towards facilitating ASEAN-China bilateral trade and improving the ACFTA through the ongoing review of the Sensitive Trade and rules of Origin.

ASEAN economic ministers said they were pleased with the preliminary work undertaken by ASEAN and Hong Kong to realize the ASEAN-Hong Kong Free Trade Agreement and looked forward to the commencement of the negotiations in early 2014.

The FTA (Free Trade Agreement) between ASEAN and Hong Kong could also pave the way for Hong Kong, a special administrative region of China, to be part of RCEP as an ASEAN-initiated free trade area that would cover Southeast Asia, Australia, China, India, South Korea, Japan and New Zealand. Hong Kong has a high degree of autonomy in economic, trade, financial and monetary matters.

RCEP consolidates all ASEAN's existing FTAs into a single agreement creating one of the largest free trade areas in the world, and would account for a third of the world's GDP with total trade reaching 740.5 billion U.S. dollars and combined GDP amounting to 21.2 trillion U.S. dollars in 2012, figures from the ASEAN website showed.