Chinese President Xi Jinping delivers a keynote speech at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) CEO Summit in Lima, Peru, Nov. 19, 2016. (Xinhua/Lan Hongguang)
With the theme of "Quality Growth and Human Development," the ongoing Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Economic Leaders' Meeting needs China's initiatives to reach its goals. [Special coverage]
Chinese President Xi Jinping is now in Lima, Peru to attend the annual APEC Economic Leaders' Meeting, scheduled for Saturday and Sunday, and has delivered a keynote speech at the APEC CEO Summit on Saturday.
In his speech, Xi called on the 21 APEC member economies to promote an open and integrated economy, enhance connectivity to achieve interconnected development, boost reform and innovation to create more internal driving force, and promote win-win cooperation to forge strong partnerships.
ASIA-PACIFIC INTEGRATION
This year marks an important step in the development of the Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific (FTAAP), as a collective strategic study on the FTAAP was concluded before the APEC leaders' meeting.
Based on the study, APEC leaders will decide on their next move.
"It can be said that we are becoming increasingly clear about what the FTAAP will be like and increasingly concrete steps are being taken," said Liu Chenyang, director of the APEC Study Center at Nankai University based in Tianjin, China.
The idea of creating the FTAAP was proposed eight years ago and was officially launched at the Beijing APEC summit in 2014. The FTAAP engages all APEC members, thus saving the Asia-Pacific region from the negative impacts of free trade agreements (FTAs) contending for members and viciously competing among themselves.
"As a high-level FTA arrangement that covers a wide range of areas, the FTAAP will hopefully solve problems such as inconsistency in rules of origin and different FTAs dedicated to different areas, thus reducing the costs of implementing FTAs," said Liu.
"The TPP (Trans-Pacific Partnership), for example, leads to vicious competition. Once the FTAAP becomes reality, it will help address problems arising from a mass of intertwined FTAs, and push forward the integration of a regional economy," he added.
Economic modelling in 2014 shows global income gains from the FTAAP would be more than eight times higher than those from the TPP.
The Asia-Pacific region has always been an important platform for China's foreign trade. Most of its trade volume and foreign investment come from APEC members. China's economic development largely benefits from the regional economy and cooperation, and China's development also injects impetus into the APEC organization.
According to an estimate of the International Monetary Fund, China's contribution to the Asian economy has already exceeded 50 percent. With every percent of growth of the Chinese economy, Asia's economy rises 0.3 percent. China and the rest of the Asia-Pacific are indeed interdependent, so excluding China from any Asia-Pacific trade bloc would be unrealistic.
"Now that the U.S. is apparently turning inward (with Donald Trump's election victory), it is especially important for China to take the driver's seat in terms of pushing for greater free trade in the region, which benefits everybody," said Oh Ei Sun, an analyst at Singapore's Nanyang Technological University.
