RP may defer entry in ‘early harvest’ scheme

The Philippines will put off participation in the "early harvest" program under the ASEAN-China and ASEAN-India Free Trade Arrangement (FTAs) if this will prove to be unfavorable for the country.

"We have expressed our desire to China and India that if the early harvest program is not positive for the Philippines, then we will not avail of it, but this does not necessarily mean the scuttling of the entire arrangement for the rest of the ASEAN neighbors," trade and Industry Secretary Manuel Roxas II said yesterday.

Roxas conveyed to the emerging economic powerhouses in Asia, "that the Philippines wants to go slower and wants more time to be able to adjust their industries because we are not as developed and rich as the other countries."

He added that it has always been the country’s position to avail of the early harvest program but if there is no firm commitment from China and India to expand its coverage, "then they can go ahead even without us."

Under the proposed early harvest scheme, exports from ASEAN countries would be entitled to preferential tariff rates prior to the effectivity of the ASEAN-China FTA in 2010.

China however, has decided to limit the coverage of the program to agricultural products under Chapters 1 to 8 of the Chinese Tariff Code.

This was opposed however, by Agriculture Secretary Luis Lorenzo Jr. who said the country’s agricultural sector will be flooded with cheap non-processed agricultural products such as vegetables from China.

As it is, local vegetable producers are complaining that their industry is reeling from the entry of both legally imported and smuggled vegetables, not just from China, but from other countries as well such as Australia, US and New Zealand.

Roxas earlier asked Chinese Trade Minister Shi Gungsheng to give the Philippines some flexibility by including industrial products in the early harvest program.

However, it is unlikely that China would give in to the request after it incurred a deficit under it incurred a deficit under its bilateral trade with the Philippines last year.

The Philippines posted a trade surplus of $122 million last year from a deficit of $160 million in 2001.