The ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA)
Posted by Ripon Abu Hasnat on Friday, June 13, 2014 | 0 comments
The
ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA)
is a trade bloc agreement by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations
supporting local manufacturing in all ASEAN countries.
The
AFTA agreement was signed on 28 January 1992 in Singapore. When the AFTA
agreement was originally signed, ASEAN had six members, namely, Brunei,
Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Thailand. Vietnam joined in
1995, Laos and Myanmar in 1997 and Cambodia in 1999. AFTA now comprises the ten
countries of ASEAN. All the four latecomers were required to sign the AFTA
agreement in order to join ASEAN, but were given longer time frames in which to
meet AFTA's tariff reduction obligations.
The
primary goals of AFTA seek to:
1.
Increase ASEAN's competitive edge as a
production base in the world market through the elimination, within ASEAN, of
tariffs and non-tariff barriers; and
2.
Attract more foreign direct investment
to ASEAN.
The
primary mechanism for achieving such goals is the Common Effective Preferential
Tariff scheme, which established a phased schedule in 1992 with the goal to
increase the region’s competitive
advantage as a production base geared for the world market.
You can subscribe by e-mail to receive news updates and breaking stories.
0 comments for "The ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA)"
Leave a reply