Kuala Lumpur (VNA) – The 9th ASEAN Education Ministers Meeting (ASED) took place in Petaling Jaya city in Selangor State of Malaysia with an emphasis on narrowing the education gap with the developed world.
Around 200 delegates from member nations attending the meeting will review issues, action plans, the fulfillment of commitments, mutual unity and assistance for common goals.
They also discussed measures to implement plans and goals befitting ASEAN’s Working Plan on Education in the 2016-2020 period.
Speaking at the meeting, Malaysian Education Minister Mahdzir Khalid stressed that the ASEAN spirit among the ten member nations would help the region’s educational sector to find its path, as well as taking measures to narrow the development gap with the world.
With a population of 600 million and a combined gross domestic product of over 2.3 trillion USD, ASEAN has huge potential to become an important factor globally and education will play a leading role in realising this potential.
According to Minister Mahdzir, in order to narrow the educational gap with the world, ASEAN and its three partners – China, Japan and the Republic of Korea (ASEAN+3) need to build partnership ties with member countries of the East Asia Summit.
Malaysia is elected as President in charge of ASEAN’s educational sector from 2016-2017.-VNA