ASEAN Economic Ministers signed the Agreement on the Movement of Natural Persons (MNP) in 2012. This is a new instrument potentially facilitating the free flow of goods, services, investment, and skilled labour, thus contributing to the establishment of an ASEAN single market and production...

In November 2012, the leaders of the ASEAN+6 countries agreed to launch a new FTA negotiation called the "Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership" (RCEP). In this paper, we conduct stocktaking studies of ASEAN's own FTA and five existing FTAs with 6 dialogue partner countries, to identify...

The aim of this paper is to evaluate the success of progressive services liberalization under the ASEAN China FTA (ACFTA). First, we calculate the level of commitments by applying the Hoekman Index. Second, we compare the ACFTA 2nd Package with the ACFTA 1st Package and examine the additional...

Competition policy is an important beyond-the-border element of the single market and production base envisioned in the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC). The targets for competition policy in the AEC Blueprint have been largely met. Looking beyond 2015, ASEAN needs to consider broadening the...

ASEAN member states (AMSs) intend to establish the ASEAN Community by 2015. A key component of this goal is the formation of the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC). The AEC Blueprint was initiated to facilitate and monitor the implementation of the AEC during the period 2008-2015. Competition policy...

The members of the Association of the Southeast Asian Nation (ASEAN) and its six dialogue partners--Australia, China, India, Japan, South Korea, and New Zealand--decided in November 2012 to launch the negotiation of a free trade agreement (FTA) among them, also known as the regional...

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is engaged in framing a post- 2015 vision for social protection in ASEAN which would facilitate productive ageing. This paper assesses existing social protection systems in ASEAN and suggests initiatives which policymakers and other stakeholders...

This paper uses a disaggregated (product-level) gravity approach to estimate the effect of ASEAN’s product-specific rules of origin (RoO) on regional trade, using original data on rules applicable at the six-digit level of the harmonized system. Overall, we find that the average ad-valorem...

The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) is a new regional integration initiative intended to achieve a modern, comprehensive, high-quality, and mutually beneficial economic partnership agreement among the ASEAN Member States (AMSs) and ASEAN’s FTA Partners. The RCEP initiative...

The findings show that the incidence of non tariff measures (NTMs) in ASEAN is moderate in comparison with other regions of the world. The econometrically-estimated ad valorem equivalents also seem comparable with other countries. The challenge is to design NTMs so as to maximize their...