2015 may be a pivotal year for Asean

THE role of Asian markets in the global economy has grown significantly in recent years, and we expect this trend to continue in the future. Many of these countries have also made fundamental improvements to their economies, and we think these changes are here to stay. This year could prove a pivotal one for a number of countries in Asia, as the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) had set ambitious plans for a new Asean Economic Community (AEC) to come to fruition in 2015. Discussions among Asean members in preparation for the AEC are still ongoing and while the fine points are still being worked out, we are enthusiastic to see the outcome.

Founded in 1967 to foster regional cooperation and promote peace, Asean is a strong regional economy made up of 10 members: Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao PDR (Laos), Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. The 10 individual Asean members already have attractive characteristics for investors, including favourable demographic profiles, abundant natural resources and low-cost labour, among other factors.

Combined into a single market, they encompass a population in excess of 600 million people and a wide range of economic attributes from the financial, trading and technology skills available in Singapore to the largely untapped reserves of labour and natural resources in Myanmar that, when combined, could well represent far more than the sum of their parts. The AEC was envisaged to have the following key characteristics: a single market and production base, a highly competitive economic region, a region of equitable economic development and a region fully integrated into the global economy.