The Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation (Apec) forum should be more modest in its aims, according to a Pacific Basin Economic Council official.
Chairman Helmut Sohmen said that while he understood the two bodies shared the same goal of facilitating freer global trade and creating a healthy investment climate, Apec members should stop claiming the credit for wealth creation.
'By doing what they are doing they suggest that they are acting as saviours by dismantling [trade] barriers,' Mr Sohmen said.
By removing tariffs, member economies were doing no more than getting rid of obstacles previously introduced by their governments.
'They are very good at setting deadlines and making programmatic declarations,' he said. 'But when it comes down to the nitty gritty of early tariff reduction, the devil creeps in.' Mr Sohmen has long been an outspoken critic of Apec, saying the 21-member organisation has often fallen short of its stated intentions on trade liberalisation.
Part of the problem, he said, was that Apec sought to achieve consensus on issues such as tariff removal, which individual governments were capable of implementing unilaterally if they wanted to.
