|
13th APEC ECONOMIC LEADERS' MEETING
BUSAN DECLARATION
Busan, Korea, 18-19 November 2005
We, Economic Leaders of the member economies of the Asia Pacific
Economic Co-operation (APEC), gathered in Busan, Korea, for
the 13th APEC Economic Leaders' Meeting, under the APEC 2005
theme, "Towards One Community: Meet the Challenge, Make
the Change," to advance our common vision of achieving
stability, security and prosperity for our peoples. We reiterated
the importance of the Bogor Goals of free and open trade and
investment in the Asia-Pacific, and we pledged to work towards
this with the Busan Roadmap. With this renewed commitment, this
year, we dedicated ourselves to ensure a transparent and secure
business environment in this region in order to lay a stepping
stone towards our vision. We also confronted the challenges
and exerted our utmost efforts to bridge the various gaps and
differences existing in the region. As a result, APEC, as the
single forum encompassing the Asia-Pacific region, has not only
kept its past pledges but also has succeeded in presenting the
future direction that APEC should be heading towards.
Advancing Freer Trade
With a firm belief that the engine of this region's economic
growth is a strengthened multilateral trading system, APEC Economic
Leaders have supported the World Trade Organisation (WTO) since
the inception of the Leaders' Meeting. We believe that APEC,
as a forum of the world's leading trading economies must manifest
leadership in strengthening the multilateral trading system.
We showed our strong political will in a separate statement,
in which we declared our firm support for the WTO Doha Development
Agenda (DDA) negotiations to proceed expeditiously so as to
achieve an ambitious and overall balanced outcome at the end
of the Round. We also supported the efforts to promptly conclude
the accession of Russia and Viet Nam to the WTO.
We welcomed the outcomes of the Midterm Stocktake on the progress
towards achieving the Bogor Goals, which confirm that APEC has
made momentous strides towards free and open trade and investment.
We are convinced that both our individual and collective efforts
towards the Bogor Goals have contributed to rapid and sustained
economic growth as well as to significant improvements in the
welfare of our people.
To respond to new challenges that emerged from the evolving
international trade environment and to reach the Bogor Goals
by the declared timelines, we endorsed the Busan Roadmap to
the Bogor Goals composed of:
*
Support for the Multilateral Trading System;
*
Strengthening Collective and Individual Actions;
*
Promotion of High-Quality Regional Trade Agreements and Free
Trade Agreements (RTAs/FTAs);
*
Busan Business Agenda;
*
A Strategic Approach to Capacity Building; and
*
The Pathfinder Approach.
We reaffirmed our commitment to advance economic and technical
cooperation (ECOTECH) to ensure equitable growth and shared
prosperity in the region. We underscored that ECOTECH was not
only important by itself, but also a cross-cutting issue relevant
to advance trade and investment liberalisation and facilitation.
We welcomed, in particular, one element of the Busan Roadmap,
the Busan Business Agenda, which, in response to the specific
concerns of our business community, calls for further reductions
in trade transaction costs by five percent by 2010, a comprehensive
business facilitation program, and new work on intellectual
property rights (IPR), trade facilitation, anti-corruption,
investment, and secure trade.
We agreed that high-quality RTAs/FTAs were important avenues
to achieve free and open trade and investment and called for
ongoing work to pursue high quality, transparency and broad
consistency in RTAs/FTAs in the region. We also welcomed the
APEC Trade Facilitation Model Measures for RTAs/FTAs that would
serve to function as a meaningful reference for negotiating
RTAs/FTAs, and called for the development of model measures
for as many commonly accepted FTA chapters as possible by 2008.
In recognition of the importance of strong IPR protection and
enforcement to economic growth and trade in the Asia-Pacific
region, we welcomed the APEC Anti-Counterfeiting and Piracy
Initiative and endorsed the model guidelines to stop international
trade in counterfeit and pirated goods, reduce on-line piracy,
and prevent the sale of counterfeit and pirated goods over the
Internet. We also called for future work to address IPR protection
and enforcement challenges in the region in 2006 in close consultation
with the private sector.
We instructed Ministers to work on behind-the-border issues
in order to enhance the business-friendly environment in the
Asia-Pacific. We welcomed the adoption of the APEC Work Plan
on the Leaders' Agenda to Implement Structural Reform toward
2010 (LAISR 2010) as a policy-oriented approach to bring about
needed structural reforms. We also welcomed the initiative to
develop a Private Sector Development agenda for APEC to create
an enabling environment for small businesses.
We took note of the recommendations from the APEC Business
Advisory Council (ABAC). We will continue to work with the business
sector in our venture towards improving the business environment
in the Asia-Pacific.
Safe and Transparent Asia-Pacific Region: Enhancing Human Security
We condemned terrorist acts in the region that took thousands
of lives and aimed to destabilise economic prosperity and security
in the Asia-Pacific region. These acts constitute a clear challenge
to APEC's goal of advancing prosperity and its complementary
mission of enhancing security. To confront these ongoing threats,
we reaffirmed our commitment made in Bangkok and Santiago to
review progress on our efforts to dismantle trans-boundary terrorist
groups, eliminate the threat of weapons of mass destruction
and their means of delivery, and confront other direct threats
to our region, and to take the appropriate individual and joint
actions to further these important goals. We affirmed our commitment
to ensure that any measure taken to combat terrorism comply
with all relevant obligations under international law, in particular
international human rights, refugee and humanitarian law.
We encouraged implementation of APEC counter-terrorism, secure
trade and safe travel commitments. We welcomed new initiatives
on the safe handling of and trade in radioactive sources, the
reduction of airport vulnerability to Man-Portable Air Defense
System (MANPADS), Total Supply Chain Security and the APEC Framework
for the Security and Facilitation of Global Trade. We welcomed
the successful Regional Movement Alert List (RMAL) pilot and
work on its expansion in 2006, and capacity building undertaken
to advance ship and port security standards and other security
initiatives.
We recalled the horrific regional natural disasters of the
past year and conveyed our condolences to the bereaved families.
We committed to protecting our economies by taking action to
lessen the impact from future disasters and improve our collective
response capability. We commended Ministers for their swift
response to disasters this year.
We endorsed the APEC Initiative on Preparing for and Mitigating
an Influenza Pandemic, which commits our economies to effective
surveillance, transparency and openness, and close domestic,
regional and international coordination and collaboration. We
also committed to multi-sectoral preparedness planning, timely
data and sample sharing, science-based decision-making regarding
trade and travel, and early implementation, where appropriate,
of the revised International Health Regulations. We supported
efforts of the WHO, FAO, OIE, and the International Partnership
on Avian and Pandemic Influenza, the outcomes of the APEC Meeting
on Avian Influenza Preparedness and the Health Ministerial on
Global Pandemic Influenza Readiness in 2005, and looked forward
to the APEC Symposium on Emerging Infectious Diseases in 2006.
We agreed on collective, practical measures, including: strengthening
cooperation and technical assistance among APEC economies to
limit avian influenza at its source and prevent human outbreaks;
developing a list of available and funded regional experts and
capabilities for responding rapidly to pandemic influenza in
its early stages; testing pandemic preparedness, beginning with
a desk-top simulation exercise in early 2006 to test regional
responses and communication networks; enhancing public and business
outreach and risk communication; and exchanging information
on border screening procedures and controls to increase transparency
and to reduce risk to trade and travellers.
We shared our concern on the impact of high oil prices and
agreed to respond to it urgently by addressing the supply and
demand of the energy market simultaneously through: cooperative
efforts to increase investment, to expand cross-border trade
and to accelerate energy technology development, thereby reducing
the region's vulnerability and securing its energy supply; and
promotion of energy efficiency and conservation and diversification
measures, which would help to reduce the demand of fossil fuels
and lower speculative demand in the oil industry.
We emphasised the need to develop increased energy resources
in ways that addressed poverty eradication, economic growth,
and pollution reduction, and the need to address climate change
objectives. In this context, we welcomed the UN Climate Change
Conference to be held in Montreal, Canada, later this year.
We agreed to intensify regional cooperation to deny a safe
haven to officials and individuals guilty of corruption, those
who corrupt them and their illicitly-acquired assets, and to
prosecute those engaged in bribery, including in international
business transactions. We further agreed that the implementation
by our relevant economies of the principles of the United Nations
Convention against Corruption can have a positive impact in
advancing our commitment towards a cleaner and more honest and
transparent community in the Asia-Pacific region. We welcomed
the signing of the ABAC Anti-corruption pledge by the CEOs at
the APEC 2005 CEO Summit and encouraged public-private partnership
in this campaign.
APEC's Progress into the Future
We are confident that important milestones have been set this
year in paving the way for APEC's future. We firmly believe
APEC will increasingly contribute to its members' prosperity
and meet any new challenge with confidence.
We acknowledged the importance of ensuring that all of our
citizens have the opportunity to share the benefits generated
by trade liberalisation and economic growth. We agreed to conduct
a study of ways to confront the challenges and impediments related
to socio-economic disparity issues. APEC intends to build on
its ongoing work to expand the circle of beneficiaries of economic
growth through such means as providing economic and technical
cooperation, particularly, measures of capacity building, encouraging
economic reforms and fighting corruption.
We recognised the significant contributions that women have
made to the economic development of the region and committed
to ensuring the integration of gender in the activities across
all APEC fora.
We highlighted the importance of innovation and sharing advanced
technologies among members in the years to come. We acknowledged
the efforts made in reaching the Brunei Goals and instructed
Ministers to maintain the momentum. We endorsed in full the
message that APEC imparted to the World Summit on Information
Society (WSIS).
We welcomed the concrete outcomes of APEC Reform efforts taken
this year in making APEC more efficient and result-oriented.
We instructed Ministers to continue to work on APEC Reform to
respond to new concerns from member economies, civil society
and business. We endorsed the measures taken to increase the
productivity of APEC activities related to economic and technical
cooperation.
We noted that our efforts have contributed to creating an Asia-Pacific
community and welcomed the contribution of the cultural agenda
to the efforts by facilitating a deeper understanding among
the people and lowering psychological barriers.
We endorsed in full the Joint Statement agreed by Ministers
at the 17th APEC Ministerial Meeting.
|