Next year's APEC host backs Cebu Action Plan

• Source: http://www.pna.gov.ph/index.php?nid=1&rid=802765
• Friday, September 11, 2015

(PNA), CTB/PND/RSM

CEBU CITY, Sept. 11 (PNA) -- As it gears to host next year's Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), Peru has pledged its all-out support for the "ambitious proposal" that is the Cebu Action Plan, to be unveiled Friday.

The discussions here among finance leaders of APEC member economies, according to Peruvian Ministry of Finance and the Economy Director Fabier Roca, will nourish Peru when it hosts the APEC in 2016.

"Peru is firmly committed to the Cebu Action Plan," Fabianis said during a press briefing held here Wednesday.

"When we host APEC, we will prepare the discussion for the implementation of the action plan, especially in the financial resilience and financial transparency micro economic issues," he added.

"A deep and impressive agenda" is how Fabianis described the CAP, even as APEC tries to draft an effective way for its implementation, at least in the short-term plan in the case of the Philippines and Vietnam.

"A very comprehensive action plan against not only a volatile market, but also to foster capital market development, to exchange information, to promote trade and investment through financial integration, and to make economies more resilient to economic shocks and disasters," he stressed.

There is also significant support from other APEC members for many policies and activities that are proposed to be included in the action plan.

The Cebu Action Plan, a development roadmap drafted by the Philippines with inputs from development partners and other member economies of the APEC, will be formally launched on Friday, following a series of Philippine-hosted meetings and workshops earlier in the year among senior officials from finance ministries across the Asia Pacific.

The CAP has four pillars: (1) financial integration, (2) fiscal reforms and transparency, (3) financial resilience, and (4) infrastructure development and financing.

"We have full commitments on that," he assured. "The Cebu Action Plan is an ambitious proposal which we believe the Asia-Pacific economies should be undertaking in order to build inclusive and resilient economies."

According to Fabianis, the pillars must be implemented, considering the unity of the economies."

"We understand that not all the APEC members are ready to implement in the short term but we must work with those economies to try to implement this instrument, to work and discuss around the instrument," he added.