Leaders of Asia-Pacific nations will focus on protectionism, trade imbalances and the ease of doing business when they meet in Singapore next month, the director of the APEC grouping said on Tuesday, according to Reuters. These are issues that have emerged as threats to a global economic recovery for the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) group of countries, which include the United States, China, Japan and Russia. "For the coming summit we are not past the crisis," APEC"s executive director, Michael Tay, told the Singapore Foreign Correspondents Association. "They"ll be looking at whether subsidies constitute protectionist measures ... the market is now more imperfect." The 21 APEC members account for approximately 40 per cent of the world"s population, 54 per cent of world GDP and 44 per cent of world trade. --SPA
