Business concerned but the AEC still has opportunities
Business concerned but the AEC still has opportunities
Lao state and private sector businesses are worried about the competition they will face once the Asean Economic Community (AEC) comes into being in 2015; however Laos still has the chance to find solutions to improve local production.
Laos already has many products being supplied from outside the country but once the AEC opens many more countries will export their products to the country.
“So how good will the Lao product be by then? The local producers are worrying about this issue,” the Industry and Commerce Minister, Dr Nam Vinhaket, said at a press conference recently after coming back from the 20th Asean Economic Ministers' Retreat from February 26-27 in Singapore.
The AEC will transform Asean into a region with a free flow of goods, services, investment, skilled labour and capital.
In the AEC Blueprint, the Asean member states have agreed to reduce tariffs, improve frameworks for trade, better enforce compliance with standards and progressively open up national service sectors to cross-border supply and foreign investment.
“We often suggest that local producers work on upgrading their production. The improvements must cover both product quantity, quality and different package designs to ensure that we have a larger market share,” said Dr Nam.
He gave the example of beer products. According to the AEC plan, Laos has to open its market for beer products in 2018. So to prepare for that time, the Beerlao company has introduced a new beer recently to ensure that customers have more local choices.
Laos still has the opportunity to find solutions for local production improvement. “There are a lot of worries for Laos, but we still have a big opportunity because we are still a young, relatively new member of Asean, and the other Asean countries have given us the opportunity to protect what we can produce until 2018,” he said.
“So from now until 2018 they have given us time to improve and develop our production,” he added. “It does not mean that all the products will be free of tax and duty charges in 2015.”
“To tell the truth, by the time of the AEC, we are sure that we can com pete in the market, especially in regards to products that are processed from agricultural produce.”
“The reason why we say we can compete is because we have a rich natural soil. Our land is very fertile.
Our agricultural produce is also organically grown and our agricultural production still uses natural methods.”
There is a trend in many countries around the world to return to natural produce, and Laos has a large potential to satisfy that trend.
vientiane times
