Apec’s economic mission splintered by geopolitics

THE Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation organisation (Apec) was created at the end of the Cold War to promote the region’s integration. Yet, the consensus-driven body is increasingly riven by geopolitical and geoeconomic splits.

While Apec’s 21 economies – which include seven Asean states, Brunei, Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam – now collectively represent nearly two-thirds of global gross domestic product and half of world trade, this week’s summit in South Korea is set to expose its fractures.

The consensus-driven approach is creaking amidst intra-forum squabbles. This is no big surprise given that it is a disparate group with an approximately three billion population across the Pacific Rim from Chile to Russia and Thailand to Australia that includes the world’s largest economies, but also much smaller, poorer nations such as Papua New Guinea.