JakartaPost-Jan 22
Emboldened by its leadership of the Business 20 (B20) agenda under last year’s Indonesia-led Group of 20 (G20) forum, Indonesia’s private sector has set out to make Southeast Asia the center of gravity in a world struggling for economic and political direction. ASEAN’s claim to leadership had always been belittled elsewhere, particularly in the last few years, ASEAN Business Advisory Council (BAC) chairperson Bernardino “Dino” Vega told executives in at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Dino was attending the elitist gathering as part of a business and government delegation seeking to pitch their country as an investment destination through the forum’s Indonesia Pavilion. The occasion is intertwined with Indonesia’s chairmanship of ASEAN this year, which currently grants the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Kadin) the role of leading the BAC. “In the past few years, we’ve seen a waning of the idea of ASEAN centrality, so this year, Indonesia wants to bring it back,” Dino, who is also Kadin’s deputy chairperson for international affairs, announced on Wednesday. According to its charter, ASEAN aims to “maintain the centrality and proactive role of ASEAN as the primary driving force in its relations and cooperation with its external partners in a regional architecture that is open, transparent and inclusive”. ASEAN centrality is therefore understood to refer to the ASEAN countries’ ambition to collectively conceptualize and drive cooperation in the region, impacting both security and economic affairs. To support that notion, the Trade Ministry aims for ASEAN to embark on digital transformation and trade policy reform, with the latter including the creation of an ASEAN Services Facilitation Agreement as an amendment to the ASEAN-Australia-New Zealand free trade area. Read more at: https://www.thejakartapost.com/business/2023/01/22/ri-to-bring-back-asean-centrality-with-focus-on-economy.html
