home > trade topics > trade policy reviews > list of reviews > malaysia 2006

PRESS RELEASE: PRESS/TPRB/257
16 and 18 January 2006

TRADE POLICY REVIEW: MALAYSIA

Economy gains from openness to trade and investment and prudent management

As a result of its openness to trade and investment together with prudent macroeconomic and structural reforms in key areas, Malaysia has made impressive strides in its recovery from the Asian financial crisis eight years ago, with GDP growth reaching an impressive 7.1% in 2004 and expected to consolidate at 5% in 2005, according to a WTO Secretariat report on the trade policies and practices of Malaysia.

See also:
> More on Malaysia
  

The Government's adoption of policies and strategies to ensure sustainability of growth have strengthened the Malaysian economy and its resilience to external shocks, although in the medium term it remains vulnerable to the industrial countries' business cycle.

Malaysia faces important challenges, according to the report, and import competition may be expected to intensify as domestic barriers are dismantled. In response, Malaysia is focusing on higher value-added exports and encouraging services exports. Developments in the period under review demonstrate the Government's commitment to moving from an input-driven economy to a knowledge and productivity-driven economy in order to generate sustainable economic growth and maintain competitiveness.

The WTO report, along with a policy statement by the Government, will be the basis for the Trade Policy Review (TPR) by the Trade Policy Review Body of the WTO.

The following documents are available in MS Word format.

• Secretariat report
  > Contents and summary observations (12 pages, 176KB)
  > Economic environment (15 pages, 501KB)
  > Trade policy regime:  framework and objectives (17 pages, 167KB)
  > Trade policies and practices by measure (41 pages, 593KB)
  > Trade policies by sector (37 pages, 740KB)
  > Appendix tables (17 pages, 639KB)
    
• Government report (11 pages, 84KB)
    
• Revisions of the above documents may be issued approximately 2 weeks after the meeting.
    
• Chairperson's concluding remarks
    
• Minutes of the meeting are available approximately 6 weeks after the meeting.
    
• Questions and answers by WTO Members are available approximately 6 weeks after the meeting.
    

Note  back to top

Trade Policy Reviews are an exercise, mandated in the WTO agreements, in which member countries’ trade and related policies are examined and evaluated at regular intervals. Significant developments that may have an impact on the global trading system are also monitored. For each review, two documents are prepared: a policy statement by the government of the member under review, and a detailed report written independently by the WTO Secretariat. These two documents are then discussed by the WTO’s full membership in the Trade Policy Review Body (TPRB). These documents and the proceedings of the TPRB’s meetings are published shortly afterwards.

Print copies of previous TPR publications are available for sale from the WTO Secretariat, Centre William Rappard, 154 rue de Lausanne, 1211 Genève 21 and through the on-line bookshop.

The TPR publications are also available from our co-publisher Bernan Press, 4611-F Assembly Drive, Lanham, MD 20706-4391, United States.

Schedule of forthcoming reviews  back to top

Israel: 1 and 3 February 2006
Angola: 14 and 16 February 2006
Djibouti: 27 February and 1 March 2006