JAKARTA, 24 January 2021 – The 11th Meeting of the Committee of the Whole (CoW) for the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) took place on 23 January via video conference. Deputy Secretary-General of ASEAN for AEC Aladdin D. Rillo chaired the meeting which focused on ASEAN’s economic priorities for the year as well as cross-sectoral and cross-pillar initiatives relating to the AEC.

In his opening remarks, DSG Rillo emphasised the importance of the CoW to strengthen cooperation on cross-boundary issues, to ensure that ASEAN will deliver what it promised. He further underlined that the CoW meeting took place at an opportune time, as ASEAN is rolling out the implementation of the second phase of the ASEAN Community Blueprints and the ASEAN Comprehensive Recovery Framework (ACRF).

As the coordinating conference for the AEC Pillar, the Meeting was attended by the Chair and Leads of the Senior Economic Officials Meeting, Chairs of the Senior Officials Meetings for ICT, E-Commerce, Transport, Energy, Tourism, Finance, Intellectual Property, Competition, Consumer Protection, Agriculture and Forestry, Minerals, Science, Technology and Innovation, Chair of the Initiative for ASEAN Integration Task Force and the seconded Economic Officials to the Permanent Missions to ASEAN, were also present.

At the meeting, AEC sectoral bodies discussed preliminary findings of the Mid-Term Review of the AEC Blueprint 2025 to ensure follow up to the recommendations. Key elements of the Phase II Sectoral Work Plans (2021 to 2025) of some sectors and further updates on relevant Sectoral Work Plans were presented, highlighting areas where collaboration is required from other sectors.

As part of improving ASEAN’s work processes, the CoW also considered the proposed Terms of Reference to improve its governance and processes.

The Committee of Permanent Representatives, Chairs of the Senior Officials’ Meeting for Political-Security Community, the Senior Officials’ Meeting of the ASEAN Socio-Cultural Community, and the ASEAN Coordinating Committee on Connectivity also joined the 11^th CoW Meeting to discuss priority deliverables under Brunei Darussalam’s 2021 Chair theme “We Care, We Prepare and We Prosperfor each Community Pillar, and identified areas for collaboration across pillars/areas.

On her part, the Chair of the ASEAN-Business Advisory Council (ASEAN-BAC) shared the council’s priorities under its “‘Recover, Stronger, Together – Sama-Sama” theme, which is in close synergy with this year’s ASEAN Chair theme.

Further, the CoW, together with officials from other Community Pillars, discussed on-going  cross-pillars initiatives such as the ACRF; the Consolidated Strategy on the Fourth Industrial Revolution; gender mainstreaming work; and the Enabling Masterplan (for persons with disabilities). The on-going efforts to promote and enhance the cross-pillar cooperation among the three ASEAN Community Pillars were also taken up.

The Meeting also benefitted from the presentation on a study on the Impact of COVID-19 on Value Chains in the Region by the Boston Consulting Group under the The Accelerated COVID Economic Support for ASEAN programme, supported by the UK Mission to ASEAN.

Moving forward, the role of the CoW, as one of the three coordinating conferences of the ASEAN Community, will become more important as issues faced by the region are increasingly cross-cutting and multidimensional in nature.

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