The 13th Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Ministerial
Meeting opened Wednesday morning at the Shanghai International
Convention Center.
Chinese Foreign Minister Tang Jiaxuan and Minister of Foreign Trade
and Economic Cooperation Shi Guangsheng co-chaired the meeting,
attended by ministers and representatives in charge of foreign
affairs and trade from the APEC's 21-member economies.
Speaking at the opening of the meeting, Chinese Foreign Minister
Tang said the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) has made
momentous progress over the last decade.
"The past decade is one of rapid expansion of regional cooperation
and remarkable achievements of the APEC," said Tang.
Tang said that APEC has set up Bogor goals of achieving trade and
investment liberalization by 2010 for developed members and by 2020
for developing ones. It has created a unique approach featuring a
combination of individual and collective actions while promoting
the development of a multilateral trading regime and carrying out
various forms of economic and technical cooperation, Tang said.
"The APEC has become one of the most important economic forums in
the region and even in the world," Tang said, adding that it has
provided rare opportunities for dialogue and exchange of views by
leaders of member economies and for discussions on frontier issues
related to the global and regional economy.
APEC has played a guiding role in the formulation of policy
frameworks on many other issues as well, Tang said.
"Therefore, the APEC has made positive contribution to maintaining
peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific Region and enhancing its
economic prosperity and development.”
Tang attributed the APEC success not only to the common aspiration
of all its members for a sustainable economic growth through
cooperation but also to the APEC approach of volunteerism,
consensus-building, flexibility, and gradualism.
"A
more important factor for its success is that it has stood at the
forefront and advanced with the times in response to the latest
development in the global and regional economy," Tang added.
In
the two-day ministerial meeting, participants are holding
discussions on the main theme of "Meeting New Challenges in the New
Century: Achieving Common Prosperity through Participation and
Cooperation.” Three issues - advancing trade and investment,
sharing the benefits of globalization and new economy, promoting a
sustainable economic growth of the Asia-Pacific region – were to
dominate discussion.
Tang expressed hope that the meeting would help expand consensus on
ways to respond to the challenges facing the global economic
situation:
"We should take effective fiscal and financial measures to
stabilize the market, restore confidence and facilitate growth so
as to enable all the APEC economies to come out, as soon as
possible, of the economic slowdown and the shadow of the September
11 terrorist attacks and onto the road to a sustained and steady
growth. I'm convinced that this Ministerial Meeting will produce
rich deliverables in the above-mentioned fields to be submitted to
the upcoming Economic Leaders' Meeting."
(Edited by Xiaowei for china.org.cn from reports of Xinhua News
Agency, People’s Daily and China Daily 10/17/2001)