Opportunity, challenge and solution: China-ASEAN cooperation

The fourth Forum of Overseas Chinese Worldwide was held in Beijing on July 15 on the theme of establishing China-ASEAN free trade area: Chinese businessmen's opportunity, challenge and solution. The attending experts, scholars, officials and entrepreneurs gave air to their views with zest, envisioning the prospects of China-ASEAN trade and economic cooperation.

Foong Wai Fong, director of the Asia Mega Trend Institute in Malaysia, said the first ten years of the 21st century may well become a watershed that changes the regional economics, society, culture and politics of ASEAN and China forever. She believed that the China-ASEAN free trade area is less the will of one or several countries than a market that has gradually formed. Once a reality the market will become a greater driving force for the development of the economy and society in China and the ASEAN countries.

Vice Minister of Malaysian Ministry of International Trade and Industry said we will open more and more fields including biological technology, infrastructure construction etc. and Chinese companies will have many opportunities. Chinese companies investigating here are mostly iron and steel companies because China has very strong steel production capability and market, which make it very natural.

Asian Development Bank chief economist Ifzal Ali believed establishing free trade relations is of great help in strengthening the competitiveness of Asian countries, particularly ASEAN countries. He cited China as an example where the economy grows rapidly while salary level keeps rising. After China and the ASEAN establish free trade relations some manufacturing industries would migrate to ASEAN countries where costs are relatively low.

Singaporean scholars believed that as "another engine" of Asian economy China cannot be neglected. For ASEAN countries establishing a China-ASEAN free trade area helps them ride the express of the fast growing Chinese economy and securing their status as an important economic zone, which accords with their interests.

The BBC reported that countries that have signed agreement with China all expressed optimism on the prospects. They said one should see the long-term benefits the agreement will bring to the region.

Philippine trade and industry minister Thomas Aquino is very optimistic that the GDP of ASEAN countries would grow at the average of 1 percent while China would also grow by 0.3 percent. We provide R&D software and technological support while China and India are our large processing plants. This way, our products will have stronger competitiveness in the international market.

Zhang Yunling, director of the Asia Pacific Institute of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said while delivering speech: the construction of "the China-ASEAN free trade area" is a choice based on the interests and strategies of the both sides. It can bring huge returns to both sides.

Zhang said since joining the WTO China has participated in and pushed ahead regional cooperation its priorities. Central and east Asia is the keystone and ASEAN is the first choice. From the ASEAN point of view improving economic environment and resuming economic growth are urgent after the 1997 economic crisis and establishing close relationship with China is an important choice. Therefore, developing close relations through establishing a free trade area is a common choice agreed upon by China and ASEAN without previous consultations.

China and ASEAN are close geographically and complement each other, which means strengthening economic cooperation would bring great benefits to the both sides. Since the end of the 1980s the China-ASEAN bilateral trade has been growing at an average speed of over 20 percent. In 2003 China's export to and import from ASEAN reached $30.9 billion and $47.3 billion respectively and the two have become mutually important trade partners.

The trade structures of China and ASEAN very much complement each other. For now China maintains trade deficit and the trend is expected to continue. In the last ten years the strongest growth of the bilateral trade came from trade in manufacturing products, of which computers, mechanical and electric equipment accounted for the highest growth. These products are both key exports and key imports in China and ASEAN, a fact that testifies to the internal deepening of the bilateral economic ties.

Lu Kejian, deputy secretary-general of the organizing committee of the China-ASEAN Expo and deputy director of the Asia Department under the Commerce Ministry, said ASEAN is China's largest trade partner among developing countries, as well as the fifth largest service market and fourth largest import source region with "great potential and broad prospects".

General manager of the China Road and Bridge Group Southeast Asia region said the group is engaged in engineering projects. Among Southeast Asian countries much of the business is done with Indonesia. China and ASEAN have launched several transportation conferences, which were aimed at strengthening the construction of the transportation system in ASEAN countries. Poor infrastructure is a situation common in Southeast countries and this is the main reason for forming a huge transportation market.

He Jianbo, director of the president office of China Minmetals Corporation, said different companies have different emphases in the Southeast Asia market. China Minmetals has its business with the ASEAN countries mostly in Singapore. The ASEAN countries have rich mineral resources. Taking the advantage as China's largest company in metal mining China Minmetals has always been looking for overseas investment opportunities.

Fu Jun, spokesperson for China Huawei, said frankly it is not Huawei which has chosen Thailand, but Thailand which has chosen Huawei. Huawei set up its branch in Thailand three years ago, which has now become one of the mainstream equipment suppliers in the Thai telecom market. Its products such as switch access, mobile and transmission have all realized large-scale application, with the sales reaching $150 million. As early as 2000 Huawei built Thailand's national-level mobile intelligent network in collaboration with Thailand's largest mobile operator AIS, and it was officially put to operation in the same year. In March 2002 AIS started the fifth-phase capacity expansion and the network capacity has reached 6.5 million.

By People's Daily Online