Asean members forge 3 air-lib agreements

Written by Lenie Lectura / Reporter

Friday, 07 November 2008

TRANSPORT officials belonging to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) on Thursday signed three major agreements aimed at liberalizing air passenger and cargo services in the region—the multilateral agreement on air services, the multilateral agreement on the full liberalization of air-freight services and the Asean framework agreement on facilitation of interstate transport. The multilateral agreement on air services and freight services grants unlimited third-, fourth- and fifth-freedom traffic rights within and between the Asean capital cities and the member-state’s regions, or the right to fly passengers from one country to another and back again. The current practice among Asean members involves bilateral discussions to reach agreement for a specific number of entitlements for passengers and cargo. The agreement on the facilitation of interstate transport aims to facilitate interstate transport of goods between and among the member-states, to support the implementation of the Asean free-trade area, and to further integrate the region’s economies, to simplify and harmonize transport, trade and customs regulations and requirements for the purpose of facilitation of interstate transport of goods; and to work in concert toward establishing an effective, efficient and integrated and harmonized regional transport system that addresses all aspects of interstate transport by 2009. Asean comprises Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Burma, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. The multilateral agreements affirm the policy of progressive implementation of full liberalization and integration of air services in Asean, as laid down in the Action Plan for Asean Air Transport Integration and Liberalization adopted at the 10th Asean Transport Ministers Meeting on November 23 in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. Philippine Airlines and Cebu Pacific are looking forward to the implementation of the new agreements for as long as the Philippines carriers are “given fair treatment,” they said. The third freedom right is the right of an air carrier to carry passengers and cargo from its own country to a foreign country; the fourth freedom is the right of an air carrier to carry passengers and cargo from another country to its own (return service). Most countries give the fourth freedom to air carriers at the same time the third freedom is given out. Every air carrier in the world usually has third and fourth freedoms for their international service. Fifth freedom, on the other hand, is the air carriers’ right to transfer passengers, and cargo from one’s country to another country and to continue on to a third country. (With Wilfredo Rodolfo III)