ASEAN Economic Community Blueprint


Book Description

On 28 July 2008, the ASEAN Studies Centre and the Regional Economic Studies Programme, both of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, and the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung organized a roundtable on The ASEAN Economic Community Blueprint. The brainstorming session gathered Southeast Asian experts from the region to discuss the AEC Blueprint, which ASEANs leaders had adopted at their summit meeting in November 2007, and the prospects of any obstacles to its implementation by the target year, 2015. The roundtable started with a progress report on the AEC Blueprint given by S. Pushpanathan, Principal Director of Economic Integration and Finance, ASEAN Secretariat, Jakarta. Thereafter, the sessions examined the various aspects of the Blueprint tackling the non-tariff barriers, designing a comprehensive ASEAN Investment Agreement, a regional framework for competition policy, the role of infrastructure development in economic integration, the importance of international production networks in economic integration, etc.




ASEAN Economic Integration


Book Description

Given the rapid emergence of regional economic arrangements in Asia, especially in Southeast Asia, it is useful to understand clearly what regionalism implies for the region, as well as to take stock as to the far-reaching and complicated effects of formal economic cooperation and integration. This book allows the reader to better understand the relevant international policies of the Southeast Asian economies, and to appreciate the potential lessons for other developing regions. It also focuses on the regionalism trend with an explicit application to ASEAN, as well as the implications of regionalism in the developed countries.The goal of this book is to survey the economics and political economy of regionalism in the ASEAN context from a variety of perspectives and using various techniques, from standard economic analysis of preferential trading arrangements to the political economy analysis of institutions. Its approach is comprehensive in that it includes ASEAN economic integration in the areas of trade, foreign direct investment, and finance. Presentation of the material is designed to be accessible to non-technical audiences without sacrificing the rigor expected by economists and other experts.




Skilled Labor Mobility and Migration


Book Description

One of the primary objectives of the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC), established in 2015, was to boost skilled labor mobility within the region. This insightful book takes stock of the existing trends and patterns of skilled labor migration in the ASEAN. It endeavors to identify the likely winners and losers from the free movement of natural persons within the region through counterfactual policy simulations. Finally, it discusses existing issues and obstacles through case studies, as well as other sectoral examples.







ASEAN 2030


Book Description

This book investigates long-term development issues for members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). It finds that with the proper policy mix—including domestic structural reforms and bold initiatives for regional integration—ASEAN has the potential to reach by 2030 the average quality of life enjoyed today in advanced economies and to fulfill its aspirations to become a resilient, inclusive, competitive, and harmonious (RICH) region. Key challenges moving forward are to enhance macroeconomic and financial stability, support equitable growth, promote competitiveness and innovation, and protect the environment. Overcoming these challenges to build a truly borderless economic region implies eliminating remaining barriers to the flow of goods, services, and production factors; strengthening competitiveness and the institutional framework; and updating some governing principles. But ASEAN should not merely copy the European Union. It must maintain its flexibility and pragmatism without creating a bloated regional bureaucracy. The study’s main message is that through closer integration, ASEAN can form a partnership for achieving shared prosperity in the region and around the globe.




Asian Economic Integration Report 2021


Book Description

The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic disrupted both supply and demand sides of an interconnected world economy in 2020. Asia and the Pacific was not immune as lockdowns and travel and trade restrictions affected nearly all aspects of cross-border economic activity. This publication examines the initial impact on trade, investment, finance, and people’s mobility across the region as the pandemic struck. It looks at how regional economies individually or collectively respond to the crisis by, for example, leveraging rapid technological progress and digitalization as well as increasing services trade to reconnect and recover. The theme chapter focuses on digital platforms and how they can accelerate digital transformation across the region.




ASEAN-India Development and Cooperation Report 2015


Book Description

India‘s engagement with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is at the heart of its Look East Policy. As a regional bloc, ASEAN has developed much faster than any of the other blocs in the Asia-Pacific. With ASEAN and India working towards establishing a Comprehensive Free Trade Area through Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (RCEP), their cooperation will be key to promoting economic stability, competitiveness, growth and integration in the region. This Report: provides a comparative analysis of the global and regional economies; examines the impact and implications of India ASEAN integration; assesses policy priorities, effectiveness, implementation imperatives and challenges; and discusses themes central to the economic sustainability of the region, including public and foreign policy, trade facilitation, financial and scientific cooperation, food security, energy cooperation, and productivity and opportunities in the manufacturing and service sectors. It will be invaluable to scholars and researchers of economics, international relations, development studies, area studies, as well as policy-makers, administrators, private sector professionals, and non-governmental organisations in the field.




Roadmap to an ASEAN Economic Community


Book Description

At the Ninth ASEAN Summit in Bali on 7 October 2003, the leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations agreed to establish an ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) by 2020. It is envisaged that the AEC would be a single market and production base, with a free flow of goods and services, investments, capital and skilled labour. An integrated ASEAN with a sizeable market of over 500 million people could become an alternative to China as a regional production base for MNCs. Although there are roadmaps for the fast-track integration of eleven priority sectors, an overall longer-term roadmap needs to be formulated to realize the AEC. This book addresses the main issues.




East Asian Integration


Book Description

The growth of world trade has been stagnant in recent times; trade liberalisation now has been challenged. The recent rise of anti-globalisation calls for a better integration in East Asia. How should East Asia manage its openness? This book provides profound analyses on rules of origins, non-tariff measures, restrictiveness in services and investment. It gives insight into how East Asian countries should shape its trade, investment and industrial policies. This book helps to answer what kind of a better integration it should be, and how East Asia can realise it.




The ASEAN Economic Community


Book Description

This is an important and timely volume: important because ASEAN is an increasingly significant and influential regional and global actor; and timely because, as the 2015 ASEAN Economic Community target approaches, what is needed is a sympathetic yet arms-length survey of the issues and challenges. ASEAN will miss some of the targets laid out in its AEC Blueprint, but the reader is left in no doubt that the ASEAN spirit is alive and well. The editors include a distinguished former Secretary General of ASEAN and the leading academic analyst of ASEAN economic cooperation. They and their co-editors are to be congratulated for soliciting contributions from an outstanding and diverse group of authors, and then adding their highly authoritative commentary and analysis. A must read for anybody seriously interested in ASEAN.