December 1998. The Governments of Brunei Darussalam, the Republic of Indonesia, the Lao People's Democratic Republic, Malaysia, the Union of Myanmar, the Republic of the Philippines, the Republic of Singapore, the Kingdom of Thailand and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, Member States of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (hereinafter referred to as "ASEAN"); MINDFUL that in 1992 the ASEAN Heads of Government declared that an ASEAN Free Trade Area shall be established in the region and that in 1995 they agreed to accelerate its implementation to the year 2003; NOTING the Agreement on the Common Effective Preferential Tariff (CEPT) Scheme for the ASEAN Free Trade Area signed on 28 January 1992, which provides for the border and non-border areas of cooperation to supplement and complement the liberalisation of trade including, among others, the harmonisation of standards, reciprocal recognition of tests and certification of products; RECALLING that in 1995, the ASEAN Heads of Governments adopted, in the Bangkok Summit Declaration, the Agenda for Greater Economic Integration, which includes, among others, the introduction of greater transparency in standards and conformance, the alignment of national standards with international standards and undertaking projects to facilitate mutual recognition arrangements (hereinafter referred to as "MRAs") to facilitate greater intra-regional trade; RECOGNISING that MRAs for conformity assessment activities could be an important means of eliminating Technical Barriers to Trade and enhancing market access and that such mutual recognition could be of particular interest to small and medium-sized businesses in ASEAN; RECOGNISING further that MRAs could contribute positively in encouraging greater international harmonization of standards and regulations and that any such MRAs would require confidence in the other Member States' capacity and competence to test or assess conformity to a Member State's own requirements; MINDFUL of the different levels of infrastructure for Standards and Conformity Assessment and economic development of ASEAN Member States; REITERATING their commitments under the World Trade Organization Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade and noting that the Agreement encourages Contracting Parties to enter into negotiations for the conclusion of agreement for the mutual recognition of results of each other's conformity assessment; and DESIRING to formulate a framework agreement to deepen and broaden cooperation on Standards and Conformance in ASEAN and to provide a basis for developing and implementing MRAs in specific product sectors, (hereinafter referred to as "Sectoral MRAs"), to facilitate the realization of the ASEAN Free Trade Area. HAVE AGREED AS FOLLOWS:
Appears in 4 contracts
Samples: 1998 Asean Framework Agreement, 1998 Asean Framework Agreement, 1998 Asean Framework Agreement
