Email  

APEC BUSINESS ADVISORY COUNCIL

Established in 1995, the APEC Business Advisory Council (ABAC) is a major channel for the industrial and commerical sectors to partcipate in the APEC cooperation. Its main duty is to provide advice on how to create favorable environment for the liberalization and facilitation of APEC's trade investment as well as the economic and technological cooperation.

ABAC comprises of up to three members of the private sector from each economy. The Chair of ABAC comes from the economy that is hosting APEC and therefore changes annually. ABAC meets four times per year, and ABAC representatives also attend Senior Officials' Meetings, the Annual Ministerial Meeting and the sectoral Ministerial Meetings.

The ABAC International Secretariat based in Manila, the Philippines serves all members and all economies. Funding is provided through a system of annual dues, which are structured to reflect the size of each economy, following the APEC formula. The ABAC has played an active role in promoting the APEC cooperation.

This private sector body presents recommendations to APEC Leaders in an annual dialogue and advises APEC officials on business sector priorities and concerns. Many of recommendations have been adopted by the APEC Eonomic Leaders' Meeting and other Ministerial Meetings, which proved the importance of the voice from the business circles. The fourth meeting of ABAC is to be held together with the APEC Economic Leaders' Meeting by the host economy, while other three meetings are held by other member economies.

ABAC comprises of up to three members of the private sector from each economy, a total of 63. ABAC members are appointed directly by their respective Leaders. China's ABAC members are appointed by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Each economy government has granted ABAC meeting with high courtesy. In the previous ABAC meetings, Leaders of the economies or government officials are invited to attend ABAC relevant activities in various forms.

Back to top