Asia-Pacific powers including the United States and China Sunday vowed to overhaul the crisis-stricken world economy, rejecting protectionism and touting plans for a gargantuan free market. Leaders of the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation (APEC) forum, who together steer more than half the global economy, also said they would maintain hefty stimulus spending "until a durable economic recovery has clearly taken hold".
US President Barack Obama pressed Asian leaders at the weekend APEC summit to retool their export-led economies and rebalance world growth, or risk drifting "from crisis to crisis".
But Obama was subject to much criticism in Singapore over his perceived neglect of free trade, with Congress and powerful Democratic barons in the trade union movement clamouring to protect US industry as joblessness soars. In a concluding declaration, the leaders said: "We firmly reject all forms of protectionism and reaffirm our commitment to keep markets open and refrain from raising new barriers to investment or to trade in goods and services."
"We cannot go back to 'growth as usual'," they added, calling for a "fresh model of economic integration".
"We will pursue growth which is balanced, inclusive and sustainable, supported by innovation and a knowledge-based economy, to ensure a durable recovery that will create jobs and benefit our people."
The summit's chairman, Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, explained that "sustainable" growth meant working for an "ambitious outcome" at Copenhagen climate talks next month. But a hastily convened climate discussion in Singapore among key leaders - including Obama and Chinese President Hu Jintao, representing the world's two biggest emitters of greenhouse gases - failed to yield any breakthrough.
If thin on specifics, the APEC declaration was a nod to Obama's demand that US consumers must no longer bear the brunt of stoking world demand, and that Asians must start to spend and not hoard their export earnings.
Obama said voracious US consumerism had long fuelled the growth of regional economies. But when crisis struck last year, Asian goods lost their most important market and the global recession deepened.
"We cannot follow the same policies that led to such imbalanced growth," he told the summit, highlighting the sky-high deficits run up by the United States during the boom years. "If we do, we will continue to drift from crisis to crisis, a failed path that has already had devastating consequences for our citizens, our businesses and our governments."
In one development welcomed by APEC allies, Obama said the United States was interested in exploiting a four-country Pacific trade pact as the nucleus for a massive free-trade zone covering the entire group's 2.6 billion people.
The APEC leaders instructed their officials to start exploratory work on the so-called Free Trade Area of the Asia Pacific, although analysts warn that the giant undertaking is years if not decades from fruition.
Noting that APEC is marking its 20th anniversary this year, Prime Minister Lee said the group must complement the G20 and "articulate the Asia-Pacific perspective on global economic issues". At the Singapore meetings, President Hu flagged China's role in shoring up world growth after the crisis engulfed the United States and vowed to "vigorously expand" its domestic market.
However, criticism that China keeps an artificial lid on its currency to gain an unfair trade edge flared anew at APEC. Obama, who left Singapore for China after the summit, is expected to press Hu on the exchange-rate row when the two leaders meet in Beijing this week.
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