EU Eyes Asean as Solution for Troubles at Home
As Europe continues to navigate its way through a two-year debt crisis, EU Trade Commissioner Karel De Gucht yesterday sought to put Europe at the center of Southeast Asia’s future at the EU-Asean Business Summit in Phnom Penh, and urged EU investors to take advantage of strong growth rates in the region. The EU is already the largest investor and the second-largest trade partner with countries in Asean after China. But policymakers in Brussels see fast-growing countries in Southeast Asia as central to lifting Europe out of crisis mode. “In Europe, we know that in the future, 90 percent of economic growth in the world will happen outside our borders. A huge proportion of that growth will happen in the Asean region,”Mr. De Gucht told investors and government officials from Asean and the EU who packed into a conference hall at the Sofitel Hotel. …
