Senator Evans,

On behalf of my ASEAN colleagues, I would like to extend our warm welcome to you and the members of your delegation to this annual consultation between ASEAN and Australia.

It is indeed my privilege and honour to join you all at this Post Ministerial Conferences and in particular to have the opportunity to co-chair this session with you.

ASEAN places great importance and high value on its relations with Australia. Over the recent years we have indeed been working hand in hand in returning peace to Cambodia. We continue to engage ourselves actively in the process of peace-keeping and peace-building there. It is my strong belief that Australia has a vital role to play in partnership with ASEAN to support economic reconstruction of Cambodia as well as Laos and Vietnam.

The present post-Cold War World is still ftaught with uncertainty. On the economic front, the world economy has not shaken off the grip of recession. Economic growth in the industrialised countries crept ahead at a sluggish pace due to structural flaws in the global economic system. The problems of huge budget deficit, the imposition of protectionistic and unilateral trade-distorting measures, and the continued existence of non-tariff barriers have undermined dynamism of the free market system and lowered the enthusiasm and competitiveness of the industrial forces in major developed countries. The recent meeting in Bangkok of the Cairns Group, to which Australia and some ASEAN members belong, has been able to formulate common positions and convey its serious concern over the lack of progress in the Uruguay Round negotiations. It has indeed provided the needed impetus before the G-7 Summit in Tokyo. And we should continue to put pressure on major players to exercise leadership and firm commitment to complete the Uruguay Round with a comprehensive and genuinely trade liberalising package including a substantial outcome on agriculture. The world economy will stand to benefit from an open and free multilateral trading system with clear rules and procedures that will no longer allow any one country to resort to unilateralism and managed trade practices.

Within the APEC framework, ASEAN welcomes Australia's initiatives and active role in pursuing regional trade liberalisation. It is necessary, however, to bear in mind the differences in the stages of development between ASEAN and Australia, and thus the pace in which ASEAN is ready to proceed side by side with non-ASEAN members in APEC. For this reason, ASEAN-Australia cooperation becomes even more crucial in helping ASEAN to enhance the level of development to that closer to other APEC members.

In this context, ASEAN truly appreciates the ASEAN-Australia Economic Cooperation Programme or the AAECP. The programme, which is now in the final year of its second phase, has proved to be a great success and a valuable tool in the strengthening of our cordial relationship. It has fostered both intra-ASEAN cooperation and ASEAN- Australia networks at political, institutional and personal levels. The programme has indeed contributed to the formulation of ASEAN national policies in a number of key areas and has also generated considerable awareness of Australian presence in the region.

I also wish to take this opportunity to express appreciation, on behalf of ASEAN, for Australia's generous decision to extend the AAECP into the third phase with funding of $A 32 million over 1994- 1998. We have agreed that the third phase would allow a more active involvement of our private sector and extend the areas of cooperation from existing areas such as science and technology and agrobased industries to new areas that are of interest to Australia such as environment and telecommunications. Such new areas of cooperation will be of mutual benefit to both sides if due consideration is given to the needs and requirements of ASEAN. lit this connection, we wish to thank AIDAB for organizing two programme planning workshops in May and June and the JPC sub-committee meeting next month to consider Phase III projects to be submitted for endorsement at the next ASEAN- Australian Forum.

ASEAN has always attached great importance to the promotion of trade and investment with Australia. ASEAN has in fact become the second largest export market of Australia, behind only that of Japan. While ASEAN is pleased with Australia's efforts to expand our two-way trade, we would like to see more actions in addressing the trade imbalance which has favoured Australia for the past decade. Such actions could include more vigorous joint efforts in the promotion of ASEAN products in the Australian market, and preferential treatment to ASEAN products. ASEAN further wishes to see the elimination of impediment to trade in such forms as anti-dumping and countervailing inquiries.

On the lst of January this year, ASEAN launched the ASEAN Free Trade Area or AFTA and embarked on the lowering of our tariffs and the liberalisation of our economies. Our commitment to AFTA is firm, AFTA's success will benefit not only ASEAN, but also the entire Asia-Pacific economy including Australia.

AFTA is designed to attract more foreign investment. Here I wish to stress the potentials of AFTA such as the large size of the ASEAN market with over 320 million people, the ongoing policies of deregulation and liberalisation, the dynamism of the ASEAN private sector, the abundant and cost competitive human and other resources, and the potential of extension into the Indochina market. Furthermore, the ASEAN Industrial Joint Venture Project or AIJV has also been improved to provide more attractive incentives for foreign investment in the region. Recognising that Australia's investment in the ASEAN region represents a very small share of Australia's foreign investment world-wide, I remain confident that with the support and encouragement from the Australian Government, the Australian investors will show greater interest to take up the business challenges and opportunities in the ASEAN region.

In the area of environment, ASEAN and Australia took another step towards closer cooperation, when Australia was invited to meet ASEAN Senior Officials on Environment at their 4th Meeting in Bangkok on 6-8 July 1993. On education, following a visit by an Australian fact-finding mission to ASEAN countries last year, it is my great pleasure to hear that Australia has hosted the ASEAN-Australia Regional Workshop on Vocational English Language Training in Jakarta on 16-20 February 1993, with a series of planned activities to follow in the future. We believe that cooperation in such areas as education, training and HRD is valuable for our economic and social development.

Having said all that, I wish to stress the need to strengthen our people-to-people contact to promote a better and accurate understanding of each other. In this connection, we welcome your proposal for closer cooperation in culture and information exchange. Only through a well thought-out programme to foster a better understanding of other countries' history, religion, culture and society can ASEAN and Australia's existing cordial relationship be put on a firm and secure footing. It would, in addition, form a sound basis for future expansion of business interactions between ASEAN and Australia.

The world is in the midst of changes. The ASEAN-Australia dialogue relationship has evolved through time, bringing benefits to the peoples of both sides in the process. We in ASEAN look forward to further progress and achievement which, in the past, have placed our dialogue cooperation as an example and set a pattern for ASEAN dialogues with other third countries.

I am confident that our discussion today will be a very fruitful and constructive one.

Thank you