Hong Kong, China Contributes to Strengthening Economic and Legal Infrastructure Initiatives

Issued by the APEC Secretariat

Hong Kong, China has contributed USD 1 million toward the establishment of a new APEC sub-fund, aiming to support initiatives that strengthen member economies’ economic and legal infrastructure to advance economic development in the Asia-Pacific region.

The contribution was confirmed on Friday in a memorandum of understanding signed virtually by Teresa Cheng, Hong Kong, China’s Secretary for Justice and Dr Rebecca Sta Maria, Executive Director of the APEC Secretariat, on the margins of the first APEC Senior Officials’ Meeting of 2021 and related fora meetings.

“Sufficient legal infrastructure is essential to economic development and strengthening economic legal infrastructure is one of the key aspects for effective and sustainable structural reform, which can bring significant benefits to APEC economies,” Secretary Cheng said.

“With the establishment of the strengthening economic legal infrastructure (SELI) sub-fund we hope to further advance member economies’ cooperation in strengthening economic legal infrastructure through information-sharing, awareness raising and capacity building,” Secretary Cheng added.

The sub-fund will be directed to assist member economies in assessing and implementing structural reform efforts to bolster their economic legal infrastructure, as well as conducting relevant capacity building activities, including sharing expertise on international legal standards and instruments, the development of good practice guides in specific legal areas and sharing of information, law and practice in relevant fields.

With the goal to advance structural reform and the ease of doing business in APEC, the sub-fund will provide funding for activities that contribute to APEC’s regional integration, connectivity and structural reform agenda.

Member economies can also tap into the sub-fund for activities that support facilitation and implementation of relevant work plans, action plans, initiatives or policy discussions endorsed by the APEC Economic Committee, such as APEC’s work plan for online dispute resolution framework for micro, small and medium enterprises in business-to-business transactions and electronic agreement management.

“A strong legal infrastructure provides certainty, fairness, predictability and increases confidence to conduct business,” said APEC Secretariat’s Executive Director, Dr Rebecca Sta Maria. “The contribution given to this sub-fund will support the structural reform initiatives in APEC. This is important as we focus on post-COVID recovery.”

Projects are a vital part of the APEC process. They help translate the policy directions of APEC Economic Leaders and Ministers into actions and help create tangible benefits for people living in the Asia-Pacific region.