KUALA LUMPUR: The Asean Business Advisory Council (Asean-BAC) will continue to inject and propose actionable measures for small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in preparing for the much-anticipated Asean Economic Community (AEC).
The measures include specific proposals on access to finance, better management methods and greater use of technology.
Asean-BAC Malaysia chairman Tan Sri Dr Munir Majid said the council is very conscious of one of the foundations of the AEC, which is equitable economic development.
“The level of employment of the working population by the SMEs is extremely high. Structural change not properly phased can have dysfunctional consequences at country or company level,” Munir said in a statement.
He said serious disturbance to economic and corporate order can result in the reversal of AEC liberalisation measures and, therefore, it is in the interest of the sustainability of the AEC that the special needs of the SMEs are addressed.
While there has been tremendous progress towards the AEC, gaps remain in the free movement of capital and skilled labour, which is designed also to make Asean a single production base benefiting the economies of scale for production, not just for the Asean single market but also for markets in countries with which Asean has free trade agreements.
Malaysia is set to take over the Asean chairmanship soon, and Munir said under the new chairmanship and with the support of all Asean-BAC country chapters, the council will continue to work hard on the SME agenda.
He said Asean-BAC Malaysia will support workshops by the International Trade and Industry Ministry to bring greater knowledge of the AEC on the ground. During its chairmanship of Asean-BAC, Malaysia will be proposing to the council that a number of such workshops should also take place, in cooperation with national organisations, in Asean countries as a whole, particularly the less developed economies.