BANGKOK -- Twelve years after the ten members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations adopted their blueprint for the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC), the common market it creates among a population of over 623 million people is worth more than $2.5 trillion -- collectively the third largest economy in Asia after China and Japan, and the seventh largest in the world.
While 90% of tariffs within the region have been abolished in the run-up to 2016, the road to full market integration is long and unpaved. In an interview with the Nikkei Asian Review, Surin Pitsuwan, the Thai former secretary general of ASEAN, said non-tariff barriers and slow intra-regional trade are among challenges to overcome. He believes the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a free trade agreement between 12 Pacific Rim countries led by the U.S. and negotiated over the last seven years, complements the AEC and should not be viewed as a distraction.
Q. What does the launch of the AEC mean for the region?
A. It is psychologically a new beginning for the people of the region and will be a transformative experience. In the past, the end of the Second World War was one also, and the end of the Indochina Wars another. This one is going to be very major because it is taking place amidst a lot of uncertainties -- and, at the same time, opportunities and potentialities both in the region and the world.