Only a few organizations of international and regional type successfully exist in the world, within which the business sector plays a central role. One such organization is APEC. The abbreviation stands for Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation.
History of creation
The APEC Association began its existence in 1989. The founding states of the association had an identical desire - to improve living standards in the Asia-Pacific region by stimulating the economy and strengthening trade.
The community started with industry and trade negotiation programs. Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation includes 21 states. These are Australia and Brunei, Vietnam and Hong Kong, Indonesia with Canada, China and the Republic of Korea, Malaysia with Mexico, New Zealand and Papua New Guinea, Peru and Russia, Singapore and the USA, Thailand and Taiwan, the Philippines, as well as Chile and Japan.
After Russia, Peru and Vietnam were included in the list of member countries of the association (in 1997), the community introduced a 10-year moratorium on the prospective expansion of the list of community members.
The origins of the formation of the association
The APEC association, the decoding of which sounds like the Asia-Pacific Economic Community, was initially seen not as a union of states, but as a tandem of economies. The organization was originally aimed at solving not political, but exclusively economic issues. APEC was formed as a forum that did not have an organizational structure and which did not have any bureaucratic apparatus. Even today, the association’s secretariat in Singapore includes 23 diplomats. Each of the representatives was selected by the economies participating in the project. The secretariat also has 20 local employees. Compared to the WTO, APEC, the decoding of which is given above, is not based on the rules for the formation of organizations, which provide for the powers to enforce in case of trade disputes.
Partnership specifics
The specifics of the work lies in consultation and in the pursuit of consensus. The partnership process between states is based on an open exchange of information between countries and the public. The community is based on collective and individual action plans created by the participants in the association that help achieve the goals of each state. Plans include detailed data on 15 sectors of activity. Among them are tariffs and non-tariffed measures, services and investment, standards and compliance, customs processes and protection of intellectual property rights, competitive policies and government orders, rules for the release of goods and direct mediation in disputes, mobility of business people, collection and concentration of information.
APEC Global Role
Asia-Pacific economic cooperation covers about 40% of the population. The total GDP of all participating countries exceeds the figure of $ 16 trillion, which corresponds to 60% of global GDP. APEC leaders have become the main tool for promoting open trade and initiators of economic cooperation in the region. Participating countries account for at least 42% of total world trade. The role of the group over the past 20 years has greatly increased. Now community members are actively:
- liberalize trade;
- promote any kind of business;
- provide mutually beneficial economic and technical partnerships;
- deal with youth and women.
General ideas and preferences
APEC, the decoding of which has already been given above, is based on the assertion that business is the basis of work, and in order to achieve success it must be stimulated. At the first stages of the community's work, systematic consultations were held with the best representatives of the business segment in the Asia-Pacific region.
In 1995, it was decided to create a Business Advisory Council, which became the key body of the entire community. All APEC member countries appointed at least 3 people to the council who could express the interests of national business. The annual BCS summits are held so that state representatives present generalized recommendations on the following issues:
- implementation of community program documentation, which is associated with the liberalization of not only the trade, but also the investment regime;
- development of economic and technical partnerships;
- identification of community positions regarding business issues.
Each of the reports is not compiled separately by each state, but in close cooperation with experts from government agencies.
First effective steps
APEC, whose list of countries is constantly updated, made the first productive decisions in 1990-2000. Emphasis was placed on simplifying visa formalities for business people in the economies of the member states of the association. The barriers to the free movement of not only goods but also investments were reduced. The expansion of strategic business partnership initiatives was stimulated. The BCS Task Force has begun active efforts to integrate material standards acceptable to the international community. Active steps were taken towards building capacity and strengthening the financial system at the international level.
A community-based task force is working hard to activate e-commerce. A set of measures was developed to reduce the digital divide between the APEC economies. The list of member countries of the association allows you to see how different the level of integration of virtual technologies in the business sector of different states was. Today this problem has already been completely resolved.
The first summit in Russia
In May 2001, the first meeting was held in Moscow as part of the APEC Forum. It was attended by 100 representatives of the Asia-Pacific business elite. Russia, for its part, has initiated the creation of the "APEC Business Club", which includes more than 50 large-scale domestic firms and banks that focus on the Asia-Pacific region in their activities.
According to the President of Russia, the country intends to take an active part in the development of community activities, including with the adaptation of the country's legal base with the parallel development of democracy. The government of a great state is well aware that within the framework of a dynamically developing trading region, it has excellent prospects for prosperity.
