ASEAN development needs China: Thai Minister

China's fast economic growth will benefit the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) for its market potential, Thailand's Minister of Commerce said on Friday in Bangkok.

China has enjoyed the success of its economic reforms and become a major trade partner of ASEAN over the past years, minister Thanong Bidaya made the remarks at a panel of the 15th Asian Corporate Conference, which gathered world politicians and business leaders from Wednesday to Friday here.

Growing demands from China have boosted export sectors in many ASEAN countries and will further promote the region's development, he said.

Taking Thailand as example, the minister noted how local- produced rubber's price jumped more than twice in a short period of three years, due to increased orders from China.

"We do need market access to China, no doubt," he stressed.

Thanong also noticed that China is still a developing country with a low per capita GDP, indicating the great potential to be explored.

"It's a booming economy...If they fully explore the market potential, it will have big appetite for lots of commodities," he said.

ASEAN is now the fourth largest trade partner of China with bilateral trade volume standing at 70.72 billion US dollars in the first five months of this year, according to the statistics issued by the Chinese customs.

Starting from July 1, China and ASEAN members will start cut down duties over 7,000 products step by step and realize the free trade agreement in 2015.

ASEAN members include Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, Laos, Thailand, the Philippines, Singapore and Vietnam.

Source: Xinhua