The Fate and Shared Future of China ASEAN

Over the past 10 years, China and ASEAN have focused on development orientation, pragmatically promoted bilateral cooperation in economic, political, and cultural exchanges, adhered to ASEAN's leading role in regional economic integration, and embarked on a mutually beneficial and win-win path.
Currently, the century long upheaval is accelerating its evolution, and the world economic system is plunged into unprecedented turbulence, with insufficient momentum for global economic growth. Against this backdrop, China ASEAN bilateral trade has become an important engine for world economic recovery.
The bilateral trade between China and ASEAN continues to grow rapidly. According to Chinese customs statistics, the total bilateral trade value between China and ASEAN increased from 7.96 billion US dollars in 1991 to 975.34 billion US dollars in 2022, an increase of 115 times, with an average annual growth rate of 16.8%; Compared to the same period, the global trade growth rate was about 10.8 percentage points higher, and the overall foreign trade growth rate of ASEAN and China was about 9.3 and 3.7 percentage points higher, respectively.
The scale of two-way investment between China and ASEAN continues to expand. From 2005 to 2021, China's direct investment flow to ASEAN increased from 160 million US dollars to 19.13 billion US dollars, with an average annual growth of 35.1%, making it the fourth largest source of foreign direct investment in ASEAN. As of July 2023, the cumulative two-way investment between China and ASEAN has exceeded 380 billion US dollars, and over 6500 direct investment enterprises have been established in ASEAN.
The fields of China ASEAN economic and trade cooperation are constantly expanding. From 2014 to 2019, China's digital service trade with ASEAN achieved an average annual growth rate of around 8%. In 2020, the proportion of digital service trade between China and ASEAN significantly increased to over 55% in the context of the epidemic. From 2014 to 2020, the bilateral import and export volume of electronic information goods between China and ASEAN increased by 10.1% annually. Digital service trade has become a key area of bilateral economic and trade cooperation.
From September 16th to 19th, the 20th China ASEAN Expo will be held in Nanning, Guangxi. After 20 years of development, the China ASEAN Expo has become an important open cooperation platform for both sides, playing a positive role in promoting bilateral economic and trade cooperation. Looking forward to the future, there is broad space for China ASEAN economic and trade cooperation.
China's construction of a new development pattern provides favorable opportunities for China ASEAN economic and trade cooperation. In 2022, there is still a 15 percentage point increase in the proportion of service-oriented consumption among Chinese residents compared to developed countries at the same stage of development, which contains trillions of dollars in new consumption space. As a priority direction for China's peripheral diplomacy and a key area for economic and trade cooperation, ASEAN will take the lead in sharing the "first mover advantage" of the 1.4 billion Chinese market, and will also benefit from the adjustment of China's industrial and supply chains.
The "the Belt and Road" has laid an important foundation for China ASEAN economic and trade cooperation. Under the leadership of the "the Belt and Road" initiative, China and ASEAN have promoted the implementation of a number of infrastructure projects, such as railways, roads, ports, bridges, and power grids, and rapidly promoted the infrastructure construction process of ASEAN countries. The connectivity of infrastructure such as the China Laos railway and the new China Singapore international land and sea trade channel has laid a solid foundation for China ASEAN economic and trade cooperation in various fields.
RCEP provides significant benefits for China ASEAN economic and trade cooperation. Currently, the development dividends brought by the implementation of RCEP are gradually emerging. In 2022, the growth rate of China ASEAN import and export trade volume reached 27.6%, which is 10.8 percentage points higher than the average annual growth rate of import and export trade volume in the previous 31 years. It is expected that by 2030, RCEP's trade and investment facilitation measures and common market effects will increase its member countries' GDP by 1.5%, much higher than the 0.4% of the CPPP.
In his speech at the 26th China ASEAN Leaders' Meeting, Premier Li Qiang proposed that China ASEAN should further consolidate cooperation consensus, strengthen strategic alignment, achieve higher levels of economic integration and coordinated development, provide more strong momentum for building a closer China ASEAN community with a shared future, and inject more certainty and positive energy into peace, stability, and lasting prosperity in the Asia Pacific region. At present, China ASEAN should seize the opportunity of RCEP and continuously improve the level of market integration between China ASEAN.
Jointly promote the process of liberalization and facilitation with a focus on service trade. RCEP requires the gradual elimination of restrictions and discriminatory measures on service trade among its members, and proposes provisions higher than those in the ASEAN+1 trade agreement on the level of liberalization of service trade. For the first time, it clarifies the content of financial services, telecommunications services, and professional services, in order to promote a higher level of openness in regional service trade. It is recommended to make service trade cooperation a key focus of China ASEAN economic and trade cooperation, promote the two-way opening of tourism, education, healthcare, cultural entertainment, finance, insurance and other service industries, reduce market barriers under cross-border delivery, natural person movement, overseas consumption and other service trade models, and gradually achieve national treatment for service trade entities in the region.
Jointly build a cross-border data flow rule system that balances the development and security of digital trade. It is recommended to continue opening up the digital economy market while focusing on the orderly flow of cross-border data security, negotiate and jointly establish a rule system for privacy protection, data security, data rights confirmation, digital taxation, data rule of law, and strengthen bilateral cooperation in cybersecurity; Jointly explore the digital consumption market in the region through methods such as "5G+remote"; Support industrial enterprises to jointly build digital transformation alliances and collaborate to promote industrial digital transformation.
Jointly promote the deep integration of market systems with a focus on standard integration. Establish a standardized and standardized technical certification committee under the RCEP framework, coordinate and promote standards and technical certification work among member countries; Strengthen mutual recognition of service industry standards, accelerate negotiations among all parties on the qualifications, licenses, or registrations of professional services of common concern, explore the establishment of a service industry mutual recognition list, and minimize service trade barriers and corporate compliance risks; Strengthen mutual recognition of market regulatory standards, with a focus on forming more specific mutual recognition standards and procedures in areas such as market access rules, antitrust standards, and intellectual property protection; Strengthen the connection of international transportation rules and promote the "one-stop" transportation of international goods between China and ASEAN. (Author's unit: School of Business Administration, Northeastern University, China (Hainan) Reform and Development Research Institute)