Roadmap to an ASEAN Economic Community

At the Ninth ASEAN Summit in Bali on 7 October 2003, the leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations agreed to establish an ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) by 2020. It is envisaged that the AEC would be a single market and production base, with a free flow of goods and services, investments, capital and skilled labour. An integrated ASEAN with a sizeable market of over 500 million people could become an alternative to China as a regional production base for MNCs.  Although there are roadmaps for the fast-track integration of eleven priority sectors, an overall longer-term roadmap needs to be formulated to realize the AEC. This book addresses the main issues.