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Indonesia highly expects APEC economies to approve its initiatives to advance trade, investment, infrastructure and connectivity among members of the regional economic forum at the Senior Officials Meeting (CSOM) scheduled to end on Wednesday.
Indonesia has raised 20 initiatives that were strongly pushed for in the meetings throughout this year and finalization will take place in the CSOM, said Yuri Thamrin, chairman of 2013 APEC Senior Officials Meeting.
"All of those proposals were aimed at ensuring the benefit of trade in Asia Pacific for people living in the region. In particular, it must support the efforts to fulfill the need of Indonesian people who want to see continuing economic and trade development in the region and remain competitive," he said.
The 2013 APEC CSOM peaks a series of APEC economies' senior officials meetings throughout this year, held in Indonesia from Oct. 1 to 2. The results of the CSOM would be reported at the APEC Ministerial Meetings scheduled from Oct. 4 to 5, Yuri said.
"So far, Indonesia should be proud for the full support demonstrated by delegates of APEC economies on its initiatives," he added.
On the first day of the CSOM, delegates attending the meeting were expected to approve eight of Indonesia's initiatives that comprise support for the multilateral trading system and for achieving concrete results at the WTO Ministerial Conference slated for Bali, Indonesia, this December, work to promote the expansion of trade in services in the Asia-Pacific region, work to promote and expand connectivity in the APEC region that supports ASEAN connectivity and in Indonesia, activities to support infrastructure development and investment in the region.
The initiatives also cover work to facilitate the movement of emergency personnel contributing to disaster relief efforts, cooperation in the area of cross border higher education to facilitate student and researcher mobility, support for tourism development in the region, and activities that will increase Indonesia's trade competitiveness as well as to ensure that the international market remains open for Indonesian exports.
"For the region's connectivity, Indonesia has proposed plans on investment and development of infrastructure in the Asia-Pacific region with implementation scheduled in 2014. This is very essential for Indonesia as infrastructure is one of the most needed by the Indonesian people at present," Yuri said.
Indonesia has been regarded one of the emerging markets in the region with continuing positive growth of above 6 percent in the last few years. Poor infrastructure has been its main hurdle to attract investors and its efforts to achieve higher growth.
The Indonesian government has initiated massive infrastructure development projects across the country by implementing the MP3EI program that took effect since 2011, aimed at accelerating economic development in the region.
Yuri added the results of meetings of APEC senior officials would be handed over, discussed and enacted by APEC leaders in their meetings that would be presided over by Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono scheduled from Oct. 7 to 8 in Nusa Dua, Bali.
APEC, established in 1989, has 21 member economies -- Australia, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, China, China's Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Papua NewGuinea, Peru, the Philippines, Russia, Singapore, Chinese Taipei, Thailand, the United States and Vietnam.
Indonesia has significantly gained benefit from joining the APEC. Its trade with other APEC economies stood at 29.9 billion U. S. dollars in 1989. The figure increased to 289.3 billion U.S. dollars in 2011. Investment from other APEC economies stood at 2.5 billion U.S. dollars in 1994, and significantly improved to 10.6 billion U.S. dollars in 2011.
