"At last month's ASEAN Economic Ministers' Meeting , members looked more positively at the establishment of such a free trade block," said Ajit Singh, also secretary-general of Boao Forum for Asia.

Participants of the meeting, which kicked off in Hanoi just one day after the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington on September 11, mainly discussed the challenges that the group of 10 Southeast Asian nations are facing.

Speaking at yesterday's international workshop on the engineering consulting industry in the Asia-Pacific region, Singh said, "Many of the countries in the region are already responding aggressively to the challenge (of the economic slump). The possibility of an ASEAN-China Free Trade Area was broached.

"Given that China has no current regional trade agreements of any kind, this should be a welcome initiative."

The idea of the free trade zone, which aims to cut tariffs and remove non-tariff barriers between China and ASEAN, was first suggested by Chinese Premier Zhu Rongji last year. Together, the two sides could create a free market of 1.7 billion people, the largest of its kind in the world.

"Now the ASEAN is seriously thinking of the suggestion raised by China as part of their measures to rejuvenate the economy of the region," said Singh.

"Although some ASEAN countries fear that China's coming WTO accession would swamp the markets of products from ASEAN, personally I think in the long run, the benefits from the agreement will far outweigh the pain caused by the recession we are entering," he added.

Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Viet Nam make up the 10-country association.

(China Daily 10/23/2001)