Value of Services Underrated in Asia-Pacific: APEC Report

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Saturday, October 26, 2002

Value of Services Underrated in Asia-Pacific: APEC Report

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A new report of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) pointed out that the value of services is often underrated at apolitical level and redefinition of service sector is required, according to a press release from the APEC Secretariat Friday.

In the 2002 report on the "New Economy in APEC: Innovations, Digital Divide and Policy," which is being presented to ministers and leaders from APEC's 21 member economies in Los Cabos, Mexico, this week, AHN Choong Yong, Chairman of the APEC Economic Committee, said the importance of service industries to regional economies is increasing, noting that service industries account for more than 50 percent of combined APEC GDP and the major drive of the growth in services trade has been information and communications technology.

"Despite the importance of service industries to regional economies, manufacturing still appears to attract most of the attention when it comes to designing tax, trade and support policies," he said.

"While this disproportionate support away from services has notcaused the sector to stagnate, it has undermined the potential contribution of the service sector to the regional economies," he underlined.

"Because of the divers ways in which services are exported, often not passing through customs points, figures representing trade in service industries are almost certainly under-estimated,"he said.

He attributed the underrating partly to deficiencies in the collection of data relating to the services sector when compared to the manufacturing, agriculture and resources sectors, noting that the definition of service industry has become blurred as services providers become increasingly interconnected with goods sector in order to remain competitive.

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