By Jihoon Lee
SEOGWIPO, South Korea (Reuters) -The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) grouping warned on Thursday that exports in the region will barely grow this year amid U.S. tariffs, as the 21-member bloc kicked off an annual gathering of its trade ministers.
APEC projected exports in the region would rise by only 0.4% this year, after increasing 5.7% last year, in its regional trends analysis report released at its 2025 meeting of ministers responsible for trade in South Korea’s resort island of Jeju.
The bloc also cut its regional economic growth forecast for this year to 2.6% from 3.3% previously.
“Trade growth is set to decline sharply across APEC due to lower external demand, particularly in manufacturing and consumer goods, while rising uncertainty over goods-related measures weighs on services trade,” APEC said in a statement.
The Trump administration’s sweeping tariffs have targeted more than half of the APEC grouping, where regional average tariff rates fell to 5.3% by 2021, from 17% in 1989, when the non-binding economic forum was established. This period saw merchandise trade increase more than nine-fold.
For two days from Thursday, trade representatives of the member economies will discuss multilateral trade and other cooperation agendas, including reforms of the World Trade Organization amid current challenges.
The Trump administration views the WTO as a body that has enabled China to gain an unfair export advantage and has recently moved to pause U.S. funding to the institution.
On the sidelines of the gathering, U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer is scheduled to hold a bilateral meeting with his South Korean counterpart, three weeks after their opening round of trade talks in Washington, D.C., and his first face-to-face meeting with New Zealand, as well as with other Asian countries.
“We’re moving as quickly as we possibly can with folks who want to be ambitious,” Greer told CNBC television before he departed for Jeju on Tuesday. His office declined to comment on his schedule for bilateral meetings.
China’s Vice Commerce Minister Li Chenggang is also attending the gathering, a ministry official said, without giving details on whether he will have another meeting with Greer in Jeju, after they agreed to slash steep tariffs at their first face-to-face talks in Geneva on May 10-11.
The trade ministers’ meeting is being held as part of a second round of senior officials’ meetings ahead of an APEC leaders’ summit later this year in Gyeongju, South Korea.
APEC accounts for about half of global trade and 60% of global GDP.
(Reporting by Jihoon Lee and Cynthia Kim, Additional Reporting by David Lawder in Washington, Kevin Yao in Beijing and Lucy Craymer in Wellington; Editing by Ed Davies and Jacqueline Wong)
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