ATIGA (ASEAN Trade in Goods Agreement)
The ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) was first mooted at the Bali Summit in October 2003 where the ASEAN Leaders declared that the AEC shall be the goal of regional economic integration by 2020. At the 12th ASEAN Summit in January 2007, the ASEAN Leaders affirmed their strong commitment to accelerate the establishment of the AEC by 2015 with the goal to transform ASEAN into a region with free movement of goods, services, investment, skilled labor and freer flow of capital.
Reviewing and enhancing the CEPT Scheme was one of the key measure stipulated under the AEC 2015 to create a free flow of goods in the region. The CEPT Scheme was then superseded by the new agreement namely as the ASEAN Trade in Goods Agreement (ATIGA) in 2010.
ATIGA was signed in Hua Hin, Thailand on 26 February 2009 during the 14th ASEAN Summit Meeting and came into force on 17 May 2010.
Effective 1 January 2010, Malaysia with five other ASEAN Member States (which are Brunei Darussalam, Indonesia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand) is a complete free trade area. These countries have eliminated import duties on 99 percent of products in the Inclusion List (except for products listed in the Sensitive and Highly Sensitive Lists). Today, the ASEAN-6 has 99.20 percent of tariff lines in the Inclusion List at 0% import duty. This means that only 0.35 percent of the tariff lines in the Inclusion list have import duties.
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