SAARC: Propagating south Asian poverty The ineffectiveness of SAARC has pushed poorer members, especially Nepal into further poverty and deprivation. SAARC has not been able to tackle poverty in South Asia. Although in this South Asian regional bloc had been created in 1985 with the aim of progress and economic success in the region, no fortune has been created in the poorer countries, such as Nepal. Unlike other regional blocs in the neighborhood, SAARC suffers from poor integration, non-implementation of decisions, India- centric and reluctant to spread out its membership. As a result members with LDC status are more affected and reaping poverty rather than prosperity. Although SAARC has made a number of landmark decisions such as transport links, growth corridor, Preferential Trade Agreement, Free Trade Area, they were barely implemented. In a contrary, another regional cooperation in the locality -- Association of South East Asian countries (ASEAN), created in 1999, has left no stone unturned thereby making greater amalgamation of trade, technology and capital among them. ASEAN has left SAARC far behind not only in cooperation among members, but also in prosperity. Poor Regional Integration This southern bloc of Asia is creeping at a snail's pace towards integration. It has hardly climbed up to the second stage of the cooperation staircase. Regional cooperation has six stages. A rise in integration to the succeeding stage is accompanied by higher collaboration as well as free flow of capital, commodities and technology without any restrictions. Preferential Trade Arrangement (PTA) Free Trade Area (FTA) Custom Union (CU) Common Market 1 (CM) Economic Union (EU) Political Union (PU) So far, the SAARC has ended up in Preferential Trade Arrangement (PTA) and Free Trade Agreement (FTA) in the territory. PTA reduces tariffs for certain goods in the region, whereas FTA eliminates tariffs, quantitative restrictions and non-tariff barriers to conduct trade freely. On the other hand, regional blocs in the neighboring continent-Pacific Alliance (central and southern America), the Andean Community (South America), Southern African Custom Union (Africa) and European Union Custom Union (Europe) -have extended their cooperation a step further to Customs Union. This alliance eliminates customs tariffs among members and applies common tariffs for other states. The nations of eastern and southern Africa established a common market under their alliance Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA). This system helps them to move factors of production-capital, labor, technology- across the member states. Furthermore, European Union (EU) has entered into the Economic Union with common economic and monetary policies among members. Amid rapidly growing regional blocs with deeper integration, SAARC is still hovering over swallow integration with no substantial benefit for its members.
Stages of regional integration Preferential Trade Arrangement Free Trade Agreement Customs Union Common Market Economic Union Integration arrangements Regional blocs Reduction of tariffs in intraregional trade Elimination of tariffs in intraregional trade Common tariffs for the rest of the world Free factor mobility Harmonization of economic policies SAPTA Yes AFTA, CEFTA, CISFTA, COMESA, GAFTA, GCC, NAFTA, SAFTA, SICA, TPP AP, CAN, CUBKR,