As the 33rd APEC Economic Leaders' Meeting approaches in Shenzhen this November, it is time to review the achievements made and challenges ahead for the Asia-Pacific region.
"Today the world has changed dramatically. It is a more challenging time, but perhaps institutions like APEC are even more important today than before, because they are necessary for trying to slowly bring back the old system that has served them so well, despite the challenging times that they currently face."
The remarks came from Jayant Menon, former lead economist at the Asian Development Bank (ADB), in a recent exclusive interview with South. He detailed APEC's open regionalism as well as China's consistent and powerful support for it.
Jayant Menon gives an exclusive interview to South on August 23, 2026 in Guangzhou.
ASEAN is a living example of open regionalism that APEC has been promoting
Since APEC was established in 1989 with 12 founding members, GDP in the region has surged from $18.8 trillion in 1989 to $61.4 trillion in 2025, with 21 members today, accounting for 61.6 percent of the world's total. The statistics, as Menon observed, bear out the remarkable economic achievements of APEC member economies.
He highlighted the fundamental policy drive of APEC, namely, nondiscriminatory, unilateral joint liberalization.
The former ADB economist further explained the principle to South that all of these like-minded trading economies come together and unilaterally liberalize their trade regimes in a joint fashion. In this way, they get the reciprocal benefits of liberalization without engaging in a formal or legal free trade agreement.
"It's all voluntary; it's unilateral, but it delivers reciprocity when everyone does it jointly. This will maximize trade creation and minimize trade diversion," Menon added.
Taking ASEAN as a prime example, he underscored that ASEAN is a living example of the open regionalism that APEC has been promoting. The intergovernmental organization has demonstrated the ideals that APEC has been espousing in a very practical way.
"What they've been doing in practical terms is offering their preferential tariffs, which are negotiated in their free trade agreements," Menon noted. They offer those preferential rates to each economy, including non-members, on a nondiscriminatory most-favored-nation basis.
With intra-ASEAN trade hovering at a stubbornly low 20 to 25 percent for two decades, Menon rejected the idea that this was a sign of failure and explained why.
"The reason why intra-ASEAN trade hasn't increased sharply is that ASEAN hasn't been diverting trade. It has been promoting overall trade," he stated.
According to Menon, ASEAN has got it right and used regionalism to continue to engage globally. The right definition now, in his eyes, is the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) region. That region is not just the 11 ASEAN nations, but the broader ASEAN plus five other countries: China, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Australia and New Zealand.
The data support Menon's claim. By 2025, RCEP's share of global GDP had risen to 28 percent. The number was about the same as North America's share, and almost twice that of the euro area. Intra-RCEP trade exceeded $6 trillion in 2025, up 34 percent from 2019.
Jayant Menon delivers his speech at 13th IPP International Conference on August 23, 2026 in Guangzhou.
China has been a consistent and strong supporter of APEC
This year marks the 35th anniversary of China's accession to APEC, and China hosts the 33rd Economic Leaders' Meeting in Shenzhen this November.
In Menon's view, China has benefited from APEC as it is on the verge of reaching the high-income threshold set by the World Bank, currently around $14,300 per capita, while APEC has also benefited greatly from China's staunch support over the years.
He lauded China as "a consistent and strong proponent and supporter of APEC" from the very start and suggested that the host could play a bigger role within APEC in such a critical year.
"There's been a lot of uncertainty created by the US on the rules governing trade, on the tariffs and also on the future of a lot of the bilateral relationships," the former ADB economist warned.
With China in the APEC chair, Menon noted that the timing is opportune. "And we've seen that whenever the presidents of the US and China meet, good things can come out of it despite all these other difficulties," he added.
Regarding the host city of APEC this November, Menon still remembers Deng Xiaoping describing Shenzhen as an experiment, one that has clearly succeeded.
"It's now a model that many countries and regions look to for how to design in those days, especially special economic zones," he noted.
The economist elaborated that one country identified a region within its own borders to liberalize policies in a way that's not yet possible in the rest of the country, and then used that region of liberal policies and investments to promote development, investment and production.
"Certainly, I think what's happened in Shenzhen has lessons for the rest of the world and certainly for this region," Menon concluded. "We have to look at trying to adopt more of those sorts of policies in countries that are developing as once China was."
Reporter | Zhang Ruijun
Photos | Zhang Ruijun
Script | Zhang Ruijun
