To implement the Common Effective Preferential Tariff (CEPT) Scheme for the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA), Member Countries are required to issue Legal Enactments which will bind the tariff reduction schedule for products in the Inclusion List of the CEPT Scheme. The issuance and publication of the CEPT Legal Enactments is important to ensure transparency to the public.

The legal enactments were issued beginning in 1994. For the year 2001, six ASEAN Member Countries were required to issue legal enactments.  They were Indonesia, Lao PDR, Myanmar, Philippines, Thailand and Viet Nam. The need for the 2001 Legal Enactments arise because of the acceleration of the tariff reduction schedules and transfers of products from the Temporary Exclusion List (TEL), Sensitive List (SL) or General Exceptions List (GEL) into the Inclusion List.  Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Malaysia and Singapore are not required to issue their 2001 Legal Enactment because there is no change in the year 2000 and year 2001 CEPT tariff rates and there are no transfers of products to the Inclusion List.

Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam enact the tariff reduction for all the products in their 2001 Inclusion List (IL). These Legal Enactments contain 7,192 items, 9,104 items and 4,982 items respectively. The other countries only enacted products whose tariffs changed from last year.  Lao PDR’s enactment covers 426 items transferred from the Temporary Exclusion List (TEL) into the Inclusion List (IL). Myanmar’s enactment covers 605 items whose 2001 tariffs are lower than the year 2000 tariffs as scheduled and 598 items transferred from TEL into IL. Philippines’ enactment covers 356 items of which 316 items from the acceleration of the tariff reduction schedule, 29 items from TEL-UAP (unprocessed agricultural products) and 11 items from GEL.