Coordinating Ministry For The Economy: Indonesia Encourages ASEAN Economic Growth That Is Fast And Medium

JAKARTA - The Coordinating Ministry for Economic Affairs stated that the momentum of ASEAN 2023 chairmanship was used by Indonesia to encourage the economic growth of countries in ASEAN not only to grow faster but also evenly.

"Through this meeting, it is hoped that we can strengthen cooperation for concrete results that can be felt immediately," said Deputy for International Economic Cooperation Coordination at the Coordinating Ministry for the Economy Edi Prio Pambudi after chairing the meeting of The 44th HLTF-EI Retreat (AEC Post-2025 Vision) and The 44th HLTF-EI Meeting (plenary) in Lombok, quoted from Antara, Monday, July 31.

After previously holding several strategic meetings, Indonesia reunited the ASEAN countries at The 44th Meeting of the High-Level Task Force on ASEAN Economic Integration and Related Meetings which was held in Lombok on 29-31 July 2023.

The meeting is a high-level meeting to produce recommendations related to economic pillars which will later be submitted to the level of the head of state/head of government in the ASEAN Summit which will be held in Jakarta in September 2023.

"Of course it will not stop on recommendations, but the main thing is how to follow up on this recommendation so that the chairmanship of ASEAN this year which is held in Indonesia, before moving to the next country, namely Laos, can be achieved, can produce concrete results that can be felt at the community level," he said.

Furthermore, Deputy Edi explained that in the high-level meeting which took place with a familiar atmosphere, he also discussed new matters related to the framework related to the blue economy, efforts to reduce carbon emissions in carbon neutrality strategies, and various other important issues, including electric vehicles.

Regarding the framework of the blue economy or the economy based on Water Resources, Deputy Edi said that it does not only apply to countries that have the sea, but also countries that have rivers and others.

"Therefore, it is also discussed how to explore the economic potentials in these countries based on Water Resources can be optimized as new energy sources or new economic sources," he said.

Well, he continued, this was what was proposed earlier so that later all ASEAN countries could support it. Because we know, ASEAN has an island-based group of countries, but there are also countries whose bases are like continents. Now this is then connected.

For information, on Saturday, July 29, various things were also discussed to continue to strengthen ASEAN cooperation.

In today's very dynamic geopolitical situation, many countries want to be in touch with ASEAN countries, both through trade cooperation, investment and others.

The 44th Meeting of the High-Level Task Force on ASEAN Economic Integration and Related Meetings was attended by 72 delegates from 11 countries, including Timor-Leste as the observer and ASEAN Secretariat.

"We equate the view so that the cooperation is useful not only for one country, two countries, but all feel that. We want reform in ASEAN, it can become more productive and efficient," he said.