13 September 2012. PenzaNews. The summit of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) ended on September 9 in Vladivostok, with the 21 leaders issuing a joint declaration. The APEC leaders reaffirmed their commitment to drive the region’s prosperity, fight corruption, and reduce imbalances by strengthening deficit economies’ public finances.

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President of the Russian Federation was satisfied with the results of the meeting and described it as “constructive and productive.”

“We believe that we have reached all the goals set for the APEC Leaders’ Week in Vladivostok. We have managed not only to preserve the continuity of efforts, but also to identify new horizons and, most importantly, to give a positive signal to the business community,” Vladimir Putin said during the press conference.

Commenting on the results of the summit, expert of the German Council on Foreign Relations Stefan Meister suggested that for Russia it was a success to hold this meeting.

“For Russia it was a political success to organize this event, to have such a platform for its ideas and concepts and to promote a shift of the Russian economic interests towards Asia. Russia signed some deals and memoranda in the field of energy export and it showed its interest to export more resources to Asia,” the analyst said.

In his opinion, the development of economic ties with the Asian countries could be good for Russian diversification from the strong dependency on the EU.

“The economic potential for Russia is huge, however, the lack of infrastructure and the ignorance of the relations with this region will take some time, to develop projects,” Stefan Meister added.

According to him, the rise of China and other Asian states will give this organization more power.

“In the future, a lot will depend on how the member states really agree on Free trade area and deepening the cooperation. I am not sure whether Russia will be able to compete with these states in the future, but it can learn from theses states and adapt technical know how,” the expert emphasized.

Nobuhide Hatasa, Research Fellow at the Japan Institute of International Affairs, also believes that Russia’s presidency in APEC was a very nice opportunity for Russia to announce its interests in Asia pacific region, which is now the center of economic development.

“Vladimir Putin successfully took a strong leadership to host APEC 2012 as again elected Russian President. He was trying to build economically developed cities in the Far East. He was very much active in facilitating business contracts and attracting outward investment. Russia’s presidency was very productive, in particular for Japan which could further cooperate with Russian business partners to import LNG from Far East,” the expert stated.

Among the most important and strong messages of the APEC Summit 2012 Nobuhide Hatasa pointed out a clear statement criticizing protectionism towards trade including the export restrictions on food. According to him, it was also seen a concrete progress on the tariff reductions imposed on environmental goods.

“From the perspectives of the US and Russia, APEC is a very useful tool to make them involved in a part of Asia and connected with growing Asian economic markets. APEC in which there are three super powers (the US, Russia, and China) and three economic powers (the US, China, and Japan) will continue to be an important and noticeable regional framework in the global stage,” the Japanese analyst said.

In turn, Brian Bridges, Professor at the Department of Political Science at Lingnan University in Hong Kong, is a little pessimistic considering the future of the APEC.

“The organization remains a large and rather cumbersome one, with differing agendas from members from different parts of the Pacific. The annual APEC Summit meetings do provide useful means for leaders to meet in an informal setting, but an organization such as APEC should mean more than that. I think that slowly over time its relevance will decline, as most members become more interested in ASEAN+3 and the East Asia Summit,” the expert said in an interview with news agency “PenzaNews.”

Nevertheless, Russia, according to him, provided a solid and conscientious input into APEC’s development.

“2011’s APEC Summit in Hawaii was very much about showing the United States’ return to Asia and the development of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) concept (which involves only some APEC members), but in the year since then, under Russia’s leadership, APEC has returned more to its traditional role of trying to assist all member economies of the APEC region rather than just a few,” Brian Bridges emphasized.

Meanwhile, the main problem in relations between Russia and Asia is the fact that Asian countries are not quite sure “whether Russia is really Asian or rather European.”

“Although Russia is a member of several Asian regional organizations, it still suffers from an identity problem in the eyes of some Asians. The Vladivostok APEC meetings provided a useful platform for Russian leaders to remind the Asian region of the stake – economic as well as strategic – that Russia has in the region. But changing identities is a slow process and despite the APEC Summit and despite the recent infrastructural developments made in the Russian Far East, it will take time for Russia to be truly accepted as an Asian power,” Professor at Lingnan University said.

In the meantime, Alan Oxley, one of Australia’s most authoritative advisers on international trade, Chairman of the Australian APEC Study Centre stressed that the economic importance of the summit was that APEC remained focused on the necessary long term action to build an integrated Asian Pacific Economy.

“Russia’s accession to the WTO on the eve of the meeting, and President’s announcement of intent to commence negotiations of free trade agreements between the customs union of the Russian Federation, Belarus and Kazakhstan and New Zealand and Vietnam served to underline the primary purpose of APEC which was to build open markets,” he said.

“Since the global financial crisis began, there has been an inclination at some summits to focus on short term issues, which tend to distract somewhat from APEC’s core mission. Russia’s presidency firmly redirected APEC to the core issues of growth and economic development,” the analyst added.

Moreover, according to him, there is a certain inevitability about development of an integrated market and economy among APEC members.

“The current patterns of trade and investment and regional production models in manufacturing and IT, as well as the traditional interdependence of trade in resources and agricultural products among the APEC economies is laying the foundation for such an integrated market. The membership in WTO of all APEC economies now also facilitates such a development since all apply common rules to govern their trade in goods and services. That is why it is vital that the Trans Pacific Partnership Agreement that a number of APEC economies are negotiating is set up in such a way that all economies in APEC are able in the long run to use to construct an APEC wide system of open trade and investment,” Alan Oxley said.

In turn, Research Fellow of the European Council on Foreign Relations Nicu Popescu expressed the view that the meeting of the economies in Vladivostok was focused on the process of cooperation.

“The summit can give an impulse but cannot solve all the structural problems that limited the capacity of the partnership between Russia and other APEC countries,” he emphasized.

At the same time, he believes that the main problem for Russia is the question of what strategy to choose for the regional development.

“On the one hand Russia wants to develop the Far East, but in this case it should be more open to investment, especially from Chinese firms. Russia understands this, and at the same time fears that such openness may cause more problems in the future. The country could diversify the regional links and develop relations with Japan, but it is prevented by territorial dispute over the Kuril Islands,” Nicu Popescu said.

According to him, the major economies of APEC showed the most dynamic growth in recent years, but in the future much will depend on the situation in the eurozone.

“The prospects for this region are relatively good but they are integrated into the global economy,” the expert explained.

Viktor Sumsky, Director of the ASEAN Centre at MGIMO University shared that view, saying that the global world is by definition interdependent.

“In practice, the connection between the export-oriented economies of Asia-Pacific and the eurozone is very strong. So the prospects of a recession in Europe are by no means palatable for APEC. But, nevertheless, East Asian countries try to create a potential reliance on domestic markets which in fact allowed them to confront the crisis more confidently,” the expert said.

In addition, Director of the ASEAN Centre positively assessed the presidency of the Russian Federation in the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation.

“When the global economy was experiencing serious challenges, Russia was able to draw attention to its potential, its plans to modernize and reform the economy, the implementation of which would have a very positive effect on the regional and world economies,” Viktor Sumsky stated and added that this event allowed Russian politicians, business representatives and experts to understand how the APEC works.

According to him, in general, the summit satisfied the expectations.

“Organic intertwining of several very important for Russia issues was achieved at this summit. On the one hand, it is a matter of domestic integration – the development of a more organic link between the European and Asian parts of the country. Then it is a topic of reintegration of former USSR area, as it was not just about the interaction between Russia and APEC countries, but the interaction of the Customs Union, which also includes Belarus and Kazakhstan. And thirdly, a topic of more active participation of Russia and Customs Union’s countries in the process of East Asian regional cooperation and integration,” the expert said.

“The summit of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation showed that the prospects for the organisation development are not as vague as it may seem to some APEC critics. And just the fact that economic growth of APEC members continues (while Europe and the US have serious problems) suggests that these prospects are, at least, not bad,” the analyst concluded.

Currently, APEC has 21 members: Australia, Brunei, Vietnam, Hong Kong (Special Administrative Region of China), Indonesia, Japan, China, South Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Peru, Russia, Singapore, Thailand, Taiwan, the Philippines, Chile, Japan. Given the Taiwan and Hong Kong participation in the APEC, members of the forum are called “economies.”

India, Cambodia, Colombia, Costa Rica, Macao, Mongolia, Pakistan, Panama, Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe show interest in joining APEC.

Members account for approximately 40% of the world’s population, approximately 54% of the world’s gross domestic product and about 44% of world trade.

In 1994, APEC leaders adopted the Bogor Goals that aim for free and open trade and investment in the Asia-Pacific by 2010 for industrialized economies and by 2020 for developing economies.

Russia applied for APEC’s membership in March 1995. The process of Russia’s accession to the organization was completed in November 1998.

In 2012, the APEC summit was for the first time held in the Russian Federation.