SEOGWIPO, South Korea — Pacific Rim finance officials called sustained high energy prices a risk to the region's economic growth and are urging greater investment in oil production and refining capacity, stepped up conservation efforts and the development of renewable energy sources.

Their statement yesterday came as finance ministers or their deputies from the 21 member economies of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum and the heads of the International Monetary Fund and Asian Development Bank concluded a two-day meeting in South Korea.

APEC, launched in 1989, has set a main goal of boosting trade among its members, with the ultimate aim of establishing a free trade area by 2020. In recent years it has expanded its scope to include discussions of issues such as corruption and terrorism.

Still, while acknowledging the risk of high oil costs, the ministers took a largely optimistic tone regarding the world economy.

"We note that global economic growth has moderated over 2005, but is still likely to remain robust, despite high oil prices," they said in the statement.

The ministers also welcomed moves in July by China and Malaysia to liberalize their currency systems and said that all economies need to do more to "ensure orderly adjustment of global imbalances," citing the need to reduce fiscal deficits in the United States and Japan.

"We reviewed all the potential risks to the global economy and we agreed on the importance of free trade, free flow of capital and flexible exchange rate regimes," South Korean Finance Minister Han Duck-soo said.

Oil has been a major topic at the meeting as crude prices have soared about 50 percent the past year. Some resource-poor APEC members like Japan and South Korea, two of its largest economies, import almost all their oil.

APEC member Indonesia, an oil producer where the government subsidizes prices to keep fuel affordable, said it was readying measures to drastically cut subsidies by between 50 percent to 60 percent by November.

On other issues, the ministers called for "significant progress" at a World Trade Organization meeting in Hong Kong in December aimed at hammering out a new global trade pact that would slash subsidies and reduce tariffs.

APEC includes heavyweights like the United States, Japan, Canada and China as well as other significant players such as Indonesia, Mexico, Russia and South Korea. Representing about 2.8 billion people, APEC accounts for nearly half of global trade. Also included are Australia, Brunei, Chile, Hong Kong, Malaysia, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Peru, the Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam.