Apec finance chiefs aim for more PPP investments

‎Finance ministers of the 21 economies belonging to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) see more infrastructure investments as key to bolstering the region’s growth amid a still fragile global economy.

In a joint ministerial statement issued after Wednesday’s 21st Apec Finance Ministers’ Meeting in Beijing, China, the 21 finance chiefs noted that “[a]s the global economy still faces persistent weakness in demand, growth is uneven and remains below the pace necessary to generate needed jobs, and downside risks have risen.”

Still, Apec members hope to “lead” the global economic recovery, and a way to do so is by higher infrastructure spending, they said.

“Investment is crucial to boosting demand and lifting growth. Infrastructure investment plays an important role in realizing growth potential and meeting development goals,” the statement pointed out.

However, Apec finance ministers admitted that there remained a huge funding gap between the region’s infrastructure needs and the limited financial resources of member-governments.

As such, Apec financial ministers said they “call for further efforts, including through our own policy reforms, to attract long-term financing and leverage private resource flows to fill the gap, including through public-private partnership (PPP).”

For the part of the public sector, member-countries pledged to fast-track PPP through the following: facilitating an enabling environment; formulating infrastructure development plans based on quality elements of infrastructure, good practices and principles, and people-centered investment; preparing bankable projects; as well as attracting long-term private financing.

Apec finance ministers also endorsed the “implementation roadmap to develop successful infrastructure PPP projects in the Apec region,” which had been developed from a compilation of PPP case studies in Asia-Pacific.

The implementation roadmap would be submitted to Apec’s top leaders during their meeting also in Beijing next month.

The next Apec Finance Ministers’ Meeting will be hosted by Cebu City in September next year.

The Philippines will chair and host the Apec Summit in 2015.