Enhancing regional economic integration has become an important priority for the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Building on the ASEAN Free Trade Area, ASEAN has been implementing the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) since 2007, scheduled for completion in 2015. The AEC is in many ways the most ambitious economic cooperation programme in the developing world, with its goal being the creation of an economic space in which there will be a free flow of goods, services, foreign direct investment and skilled labour. In addition, ASEAN has cemented free trade areas with six regional partners (Japan, Republic of Korea, People's Republic of China, Australia, New Zealand and India) and, together with these economies, launched the Regional Economic Comprehensive Partnership (RCEP) in November 2012, also with the goal of completion in 2015. This study estimates the implications of the regional integration initiatives on ASEAN Member States using a cutting-edge computable general equilibrium model. In addition to gauging the effects on welfare, trade and economic structure, it considers the ramifications for labour markets. Using detailed data from the labour force surveys available for six ASEAN markets, the paper captures the effects of these initiatives on seven categories of labour at the occupational level. It also includes estimates of the distributional effects of these initiatives for labour relative to other factors (capital and land) and on gender.

Enhancing regional economic integration has become an important priority for the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Building on the ASEAN Free Trade Area, ASEAN has been implementing the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) since 2007, scheduled for completion in 2015. The AEC is in many ways the most ambitious economic cooperation programme in the developing world, with its goal being the creation of an economic space in which there will be a free flow of goods, services, foreign direct investment and skilled labour. In addition, ASEAN has cemented free trade areas with six regional partners (Japan, Republic of Korea, People's Republic of China, Australia, New Zealand and India) and, together with these economies, launched the Regional Economic Comprehensive Partnership (RCEP) in November 2012, also with the goal of completion in 2015. This study estimates the implications of the regional integration initiatives on ASEAN Member States using a cutting-edge computable general equilibrium model. In addition to gauging the effects on welfare, trade and economic structure, it considers the ramifications for labour markets. Using detailed data from the labour force surveys available for six ASEAN markets, the paper captures the effects of these initiatives on seven categories of labour at the occupational level. It also includes estimates of the distributional effects of these initiatives for labour relative to other factors (capital and land) and on gender.

The goal of this book is to assess empirically the likely economic effects of the AEC on the ASEAN member states and associated stakeholders.

One of the primary objectives of the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC), established in 2015, was to boost skilled labor mobility within the region. This insightful book takes stock of the existing trends and patterns of skilled labor migration in the ASEAN. It endeavors to identify the likely winners and losers from the free movement of natural persons within the region through counterfactual policy simulations. Finally, it discusses existing issues and obstacles through case studies, as well as other sectoral examples.

On 28 July 2008, the ASEAN Studies Centre and the Regional Economic Studies Programme, both of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, and the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung organized a roundtable on The ASEAN Economic Community Blueprint. The brainstorming session gathered Southeast Asian experts from the region to discuss the AEC Blueprint, which ASEANs leaders had adopted at their summit meeting in November 2007, and the prospects of any obstacles to its implementation by the target year, 2015. The roundtable started with a progress report on the AEC Blueprint given by S. Pushpanathan, Principal Director of Economic Integration and Finance, ASEAN Secretariat, Jakarta. Thereafter, the sessions examined the various aspects of the Blueprint tackling the non-tariff barriers, designing a comprehensive ASEAN Investment Agreement, a regional framework for competition policy, the role of infrastructure development in economic integration, the importance of international production networks in economic integration, etc.

Given the rapid emergence of regional economic arrangements in Asia, especially in Southeast Asia, it is useful to understand clearly what regionalism implies for the region, as well as to take stock as to the far-reaching and complicated effects of formal economic cooperation and integration. This book allows the reader to better understand the relevant international policies of the Southeast Asian economies, and to appreciate the potential lessons for other developing regions. It also focuses on the regionalism trend with an explicit application to ASEAN, as well as the implications of regionalism in the developed countries.The goal of this book is to survey the economics and political economy of regionalism in the ASEAN context from a variety of perspectives and using various techniques, from standard economic analysis of preferential trading arrangements to the political economy analysis of institutions. Its approach is comprehensive in that it includes ASEAN economic integration in the areas of trade, foreign direct investment, and finance. Presentation of the material is designed to be accessible to non-technical audiences without sacrificing the rigor expected by economists and other experts.