Indonesia urges digitalisation, green transition to realise ASEAN Vision 2045

Delegates from ASEAN member countries attend the 45th meeting of the ASEAN Task Force for Economic Integration (HLTF-EI) in Vang Vieng, Laos, on February 19-21 (Photo: Antara)

Jakarta (VNA) – Indonesia’s Coordinating Ministry for Economic Affairs has underlined the need to implement the digitalisation and green transition megatrends to realise the ASEAN Vision 2045 as the world's fourth-largest economic region.

To achieve ASEAN Vision 2045, it is essential to have a strategy to overcome future disruptions, develop sectors with high growth potential, and embrace megatrends, such as digitalisation and the green transition, said Edi Prio Pambudi, Deputy for Coordination of International Economic Cooperation at the ministry.

According to Pambudi, ASEAN is currently facing various multidimensional challenges, such as geo-political and geo-economic tensions, green technology, artificial intelligence, an aging population, and the climate crisis.

He also highlighted three proposals related to the preparation of the ASEAN Economic Community Strategic Plan (AEC Strategic Plan) for 2026-2030, namely strengthening ASEAN resilience and cross-pillar coordination, revitalising ASEAN priority sectors, as well as testing cross-pillar coordination mechanisms in the digital transformation and technology sectors.

To strengthen ASEAN resilience and cross-pillar coordination, member countries could consider creating a platform to increase synergy and identify joint actions and collaboration between the three ASEAN pillars, Pambudi said in remarks at the 45th meeting of the ASEAN Task Force for Economic Integration (HLTF-EI) in Vang Vieng, Laos on February 19-21.

He also underscored the need to conduct revitalisation of ASEAN's priority sectors, considering the current changes in the economic landscape. Thus, there is an opportunity for ASEAN to revive cooperation in priority sectors to increase trade and investment while generating higher growth.

According to Pambudi, trials of the cross-pillar coordination mechanisms in the digital transformation and technology sectors should be carried out to see the effectiveness of these mechanisms before being widely implemented in other sectors.

Indonesia also expressed support for the formation of the Task Force for the Blue Economy (ACTF-BE) and plans to implement the first ACTF-BE meeting that will be held in August 2024 as part of the 46th HLTF-EI meeting in Luang Prabang, Laos./.