Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak is seeking the removal of trade barriers among the member-countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nation (ASEAN).
The Malaysian leader pushed for this change on how business is done in the region as he spoke on Friday morning at the “Prosperity for All Summit” organized by the ASEAN Business Advisory Council.
“We have to bring down further trade tariffs which still exist. World Trade Organization (WTO) figures show average tariffs in ASEAN were around 4 percent in 2015. The work to bring them down to zero must be pursued vigorously,” he stated.
He further said, “we must work to facilitate intra-ASEAN trade further. To achieve the $9.2 trillion figure by 2050, there has to be a twenty percent reduction in fixed trade costs.”
Najib further noted, ASEAN is now the sixth largest economy in the world and economic integration is the key for the trade bloc to become an important player in the world market.
The Malaysian leader is in Manila for the ASEAN Summit on Saturday.