Collaboration between Latin America and the Asia-Pacific region is the key to collective recovery from the current global upheaval, Indonesian Trade Minister Muhammad Lutfi stated.
"To recover together, the two regions, Latin America and the Asia-Pacific region, need to collaborate to create better, inclusive, and sustainable growth. Governments must lead the recovery process," he noted in a written statement received in Jakarta on Thursday.
He made the remarks during the Working Breakfast: Expanding Horizons for Economic Partnership between Latin America and Asia-Pacific held on the sidelines of the Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF) 2022 in Davos, Switzerland.
Others present at the meeting were Brazilian Economic Minister Paulo Guedes; Founder and Director, Growth Lab, Harvard University, Ricardo Hausmann; Singapore Transportation Minister S. Iswaran; and Deputy Chief of the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry Shinta Widjaja Kamdani, with Secretary General of UNCTAD, Rebecca Grynspan, acting as moderator of the meeting.
Lufti believes that the collaboration will be able to create more inclusive and sustainable economic growth.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has projected economic growth in Latin America and the Asia-Pacific region in 2022 to be lower than that in 2021.
The Asia-Pacific economy is expected to grow 4.9 percent in 2022 as compared to 6.5 percent in 2021.
Lufti stated that Indonesia had consistently been advocating for transparent and fair trade to support economic recovery through the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) or Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA).
FTA and CEPA paved the way for countries to boost better economic and trade growth, he affirmed.
He emphasized that Indonesia is seeking to enhance cooperation with Latin American countries.
Indonesia has implemented a comprehensive trade in goods agreement with Chile, which is in the process of revising a trade in service agreement, he stated.
Indonesia is also looking into the possibility of a bilateral trade agreement with Peru, he remarked.
In the Asia-Pacific region, Indonesia has implemented bilateral and regional trade agreements with ASEAN member states along with Japan, China, Korea, Hong Kong, Australia, and New Zealand.
Indonesia is also in the process of upgrading the economic partnership agreement (EPA) with Japan ratifying the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) and CEPA with Korea as well as is looking into the possibility of trade agreements with Fiji and Papua New Guinea.
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Editor : Mahdani
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