APEC Economic Leaders Endorse Ha Noi Action Plan
When APEC Economic Leaders met today in Ha Noi, Viet Nam, they resolved to identify specific actions and milestones to implement the Bogor Goals and support capacity-building measures to help APEC economies meet their commitments to free and open trade and investment.
The Ha Noi Action Plan, which was endorsed by APEC Economic Leaders, contains concrete measures to be taken in five key areas, including: 1) support for the multilateral trading system; 2) strengthening individual and collective actions by member economies; 3) promotion of high-quality Regional Trade Arrangements (RTAs) and Free Trade Agreements (FTAs); 4) the Busan Business Agenda and 5) economic and technical cooperation.
In particular, the Ha Noi Action Plan emphasizes capacity-building measures to help APEC economies prepare to meet their Bogor commitments of free and open trade and investment.
Among other things, the Plan calls for APEC to remain committed to restarting multilateral negotiations and achieving a breakthrough to bring the Doha Development Round negotiations to a successful conclusion with ambitious and balanced outcomes. APEC members will also continue to conduct capacity building activities across the full range of areas to enhance economies' understanding of WTO agreements and obligations.
Member economies committed to strengthening individual and collective actions plans to promote free and open trade and investment in the Asia-Pacific region. Economies' progress and commitments to trade and investment liberalization and facilitation are peer-reviewed on a rotational basis.
To prevent complexities in RTAs/FTAs and to reduce transactions costs to business, Leaders committed to complete by 2008 comprehensive model measures, which are useful references for trade negotiating teams. While neither mandatory nor exhaustive, the measures are a guide to the kind of provisions that might be included in an FTA to ensure their high-quality and comprehensiveness and to serve as building blocks to the multilateral trading system.
The Ha Noi Action Plan also sets out to improve substantially the environment for business and reduce unnecessary barriers to business activity with the goal of reducing business transaction costs by 5% by 2010. Member economies will focus their activities on trade and investment facilitation, transparency and behind-the-border regulations and administrative procedures.
Finally, by strengthening economic and technical cooperation activities APEC member economies will promote sustainable growth and shared development while assuring advancement towards free and open trade and investment in the region.
The Ha Noi Action Plan also includes an annex of key deliverables undertaken by APEC Member Economies in 2006.
Based on five major principles set out by Leaders, the Ha Noi Action Plan is strategic to enhance the vision and credibility of APEC; multi-year to ensure continuity and consistency; action-oriented to encourage the implementation process; realistic to yield tangible outcomes; and time-bound to track implementation progress.