BANGKOK (MindaNews/31 Oct) – Southeast Asian leaders have adopted the Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines-East ASEAN Growth Area (BIMP-EAGA) as “test bed” for the region’s ongoing economic integration initiatives. 

Presidential Adviser for Mindanao Jesus Dureza said state leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) specifically signified to increase its engagements with the eastern sub-regional grouping in terms of the implementation of the region’s trade and economic integration policies and programs.

BIMP-EAGA covers Brunei Darussalam; the provinces of East and West Kalimantan, and North Sulawesi in Indonesia; the federal states of Sabah and Sarawak, and the federal territory of Labuan in Malaysia; and, Mindanao and Palawan in the Philippines.

“They look at the BIMP-EAGA as the microcosm of ASEAN’s economic integration and want to see the institutional mechanisms there to move faster,” Dureza told reporters following the 6th BIMP-EAGA Summit in Hua Hin, Thailand last Sunday.

He said this development was relayed to BIMP-EAGA leaders by ASEAN Secretary General Surin Pisuwan during the summit.

Dureza, who is also the Philippines’ signing minister for the EAGA, was part of the country’s high-level delegation to the summit that was spearheaded by President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

The other members of the Philippine delegation were Foreign Affairs Secretary Alberto Romulo, Trade Secretary Peter Favila, Trade Undersecretary and Philippine Senior Official for BIMP-EAGA Merly Cruz, Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PCCI) for Mindanao Director Elena Haw and BIMP-EAGA Business Council (BEBC) Philippine Director Vicente Lao.

The summit was also attended by its current chair Malaysian Prime Minister Dato' Sri Najib Tun Razak, Brunei Darussalam’s Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah and Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyuno.

Dureza said ASEAN wants the sub-region to make a significant leap in terms of the implementation of ASEAN protocols and agreements on the harmonization of customs, immigration, quarantine and security or CIQS rules, infrastructure development and trade-related cross-border exchanges.

BIMP-EAGA’s CIQS project is the sub-region’s version of the ASEAN single-window initiative, which aims to harmonize customs and trade-related policies within the 10-nation and eventually establish a single portal for the entire region.

“As a test bed of ASEAN, the BIMP-EAGA is tasked to make sure that some of the protocols and agreements that had problems in terms of implementation at the ASEAN level will work and later on evolve,” he said.

Dureza said among the initiatives that ASEAN wants to move faster is infrastructure development, which involves 12 priority projects worth at least US$1 billion that are slated for implementation within the next two years.

He said the projects, which were approved by BIMP-EAGA state leaders during the summit, are focused on transport and power interconnection that are aimed at boosting trade, investment and tourism in the sub-region.

The projects, which will be undertaken through technical assistance proposal from the Asian Development Bank (ADB), include Sarawak (Malaysia) - Kalimantan (Indonesia) power interconnection, expansion of Mindanao (Philippines) ports program, upgrading of the Kuala Lurah (Brunei Darussalam) border crossing facility and the Pontianak-Entikong road link (Indonesia), rehabilitation of Davao-General Santos Road (Philippines), and construction of a bridge over the Pandaruan river between Brunei and Malaysia.

To help ease the financing of the approved projects, Dureza said the BIMP-EAGA leaders agreed to study a proposal from the ASEAN Secretariat for the four countries to serve as sovereign guarantors or collectively guarantee the needed loans for the projects.

He said the proposal was endorsed for further study by the finance departments of the four countries.

“This is to lower the interest rates for the financing of these infrastructure projects and the ASEAN secretariat wants to pilot this in the BIMP-EAGA and see if it will work there,” Dureza added. (Allen V. Estabillo / MindaNews)

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