The emerging signs of economic recovery in the region present APEC with a greater prospect of working towards preserving and strengthening market opening in the region as well as sustaining economic recovery. For APEC 2000, Brunei Darussalam will map the direction with the objective of delivering on the various agreements to the people and the community APEC aims to serve. The priorities are:

• Continued efforts to advance APEC¡¯s agenda on trade and investment liberalization and facilitation.
• A focus on the development of human resources with a particular emphasis on capacity-building.
• A focus on the development of small and medium enterprises (SMEs), continuing to take into account valuable input from the business community and looking into ways of enhancing APEC¡¯s relevance to businesses.
• With the increasing emergence of knowledge-based economies, a strengthening of work in the areas of information and communication technology, including growing problems of "digital divide" in electronic commerce and information technology infrastructure.

Financial Recovery

Leaders in Auckland also reviewed the broad-based though still fragile economic recovery enjoyed by the APEC region over the past year. They agreed that the cooperative strategy adopted at the 1998 APEC meeting in Kuala Lumpur and sound macroeconomic policies in key economies have contributed to a restoration of confidence and growth. The Leaders agreed to pursue a range of steps to strengthen markets including to:

• Provide greater transparency and predictability in corporate and public sector governance;
• Enhance the role of competition to improve efficiency and broaden participation by enterprises;
• Improve the quality of regulation and the capacity of regulators to design and implement policies for sustainable growth;
• Reduce compliance costs and facilitate business growth; and
• Build a favorable regional and international environment for free and fair competition.

APEC has played a key role in catalyzing efforts by industrialized and emerging market economies in the Group of 22 to strengthen the global financial system. Leaders in Auckland were encouraged by the progress made in strengthening the international financial architecture, calling for continued cooperation in further strengthening the international financial system. They also supported the on-going efforts in the region in crisis prevention and crisis resolution and urged prompt action to improve the transparency of highly-leveraged financial institutions.

Many of these efforts are the fruit of the APEC Finance Ministers process which supports a variety of collaborative initiatives to promote development of regional financial and capital markets and to support freer and stable capital flows in the Asia-Pacific region. One project led to the establishment of the Asia Recovery Information Centre for economic recovery information and analysis exchange. Other activities included holding a joint APEC-OECD workshop on insolvency law, establishing a web site for information sharing among member economies, holding a forum on pension reform, launching a privatization forum initiative, increasing interaction among APEC bank supervisors and working more closely with the private sector through organizations such as the APEC Financiers¡¯ Group, the APEC Business Advisory Council, and the Pacific Economic Cooperation Council.

APEC Leaders already provided an important boost that helped bring the Uruguay Trade Round to a close in the early 1990¡¯s. Continuing in this tradition, Leaders in Auckland strongly supported the launch of a new trade round at the upcoming World Trade Organization talks in Seattle in November-December. They agreed that the new Round should:

• Include comprehensive market access negotiations covering industrial tariffs in addition to the already mandated negotiations on services and agriculture.
• Lead to timely and effective improvements in market access to the benefit of all participating economies, particularly developing economies and, consistent with this objective, provide scope to review and strengthen rules and disciplines.
• Have a balanced and sufficiently broad-based agenda and be concluded with three years as a single package that does not preclude the possibility of early results on a provisional basis.

The Leaders also supported the abolition of export subsidies and unjustifiable export prohibitions and restrictions and, in addition, called on all WTO members not to impose new or more restrictive trade measures for the duration of the negotiations.

Turning to development, the Leaders directed their Ministers to focus in the coming year on improving APEC economic and technical cooperation and capacity-building efforts. In the area of food, the Leaders directed their Ministers to implement the recommendations of the APEC Food System, which aims at developing rural infrastructure, disseminating technological advances in food production and processing, and promoting trade in food products.

In the area of human resources development (HRD), the Leaders welcomed the outcome of the meeting of HRD Ministers in Washington, DC in July 1999. During their meeting, the Ministers adopted an action plan for responding to the needs of people affected by the crisis. The plan includes policies and programs to improve labor markets and social safety nets as well as those aimed at enhancing productivity through better workplace practices.

Management Reform

The three-year management review aimed at achieving the increased efficiency and effectiveness of the APEC process continues. Further to the achievements in 1998, some additional measures were endorsed and taken by both the Senior Officials and the Ministers in 1999. The major measures are:

• The Chair of annual Leaders/Ministerial meetings will also chair the APEC Finance Ministers process starting from 2000 to make them mutually supportive and reinforcing;
• All APEC fora are requested to prepare annual operational plans to ensure that their activities are contributing to the achievement of the goals of APEC; and
• All APEC fora are requested to implement the measures designed to strengthen the processes of project design; preparation of funding proposals; and project approval, implementation and evaluation.

During the final year of the process, a common set of criteria for the establishment of new APEC fora will be prepared. It will form an important part of the concluding report of the process at the end of 2000.

Business/Private Sector Involvement

Business has always been the primary force behind dynamic growth in the Asia-Pacific region. The continuing globalization of business means that the APEC economies must develop region-wide practices and policies to encourage the free flow of goods, services, investment and capital within the region. APEC aims to achieve concrete and pragmatic results that will benefit business, contribute to increased income and create jobs in the region.

Key features that set APEC apart from other international organizations are therefore its commitment to facilitating business and regularly bringing the business/private sector into a wide range of APEC activities. Business expertise and resources can help APEC achieve its objectives, and business is a key constituency for APEC both regionally and in individual member economies. Business already participates in many of APEC¡¯s working groups and helps shape the policy dialogue in partnership with member economy officials. APEC Economic Leaders receive advice from the APEC Business Advisory Council (ABAC) established in late 1995. Such involvement is important to ensure that APEC¡¯s work is relevant to real problems and proposes practical solutions. Nevertheless, a major APEC goal is to continue to expand the essential role of business in the APEC process.