The 13th Asian Business Summit (ABS) was hosted by KEIDANREN from 4 – 5 July 2024 at Keidanren Kaikan, Tokyo, Japan with 13 Asian economic organisations from countries in Asia in attendance.
Photo by Keidanren: Leaders of the respective delegations at the Asian Business Summit with Prime Minister Fumio Kishida (7th from left).
Malaysia was represented by Datuk Seri Mohamed Iqbal (pic below, left), Vice-President, MAJECA. Accompanying him was Mr Gary Tang (pic below, right), Hon. Secretary, MAJECA and Mr Goh Peng Ooi (pic below, centre), Hon. Treasurer, MAJECA.
The 13th Asian Business Summit Joint Statement from Keidanren (https://www.keidanren.or.jp/en/policy/2024/050.html) is as quoted below:
“On July 5, 2024, 13 Asian Economic Organizations gathered at Keidanren for the 13th Asian Business Summit.
Asia’s economic growth rate is projected to be 4.5% in 2024, making the Region a growth center of the world. Meanwhile, the world is becoming increasingly disintegrated. It is estimated that 2.5% to 7% of the world GDP could be lost if the global division of labor and technology transfers stagnate due to the global fragmentation, inevitably affecting Asia. In addition, several Asian countries are facing challenges such as aging and declining populations. In order for Asian countries and regions to achieve sustained growth, public and private sectors must collaborate to bring about innovation, promote free and fair trade/investment and develop a pathway for achieving carbon neutrality.
Based on this common understanding, we, the Business Community of Asia, reached a consensus on the following points.
1. Innovation
Innovation is the key to addressing our goals such as strengthening industrial competitiveness, adapting to aging population, and enhancing our wellbeing. From the viewpoint of bring about innovation, the Business Community of Asia focused on the followings.
(1) Building a Startup Ecosystem
Startups are the source of innovation. It is important to create a platform for business matching between startups and large companies so that startups can benefit from the financial resources and management know-how of large companies and thereby maximize their ingenuity. The governments of each economy should create a business-friendly environment for startups through measures such as relaxation of investment regulations, facilitation of administrative procedures, providing tax incentives, and offering guarantees for investments and loans.
(2) Movement of Natural Persons
Free movement of highly skilled migrants across borders is prerequisite for innovation. Governments of each economy should consider easing immigration and residency requirements for highly skilled migrants, promoting mutual recognition of licenses and certifications, and concluding social security agreements. In addition, in order to facilitate short-term mobility for business visitors, consideration should be given to extending APEC Business Travel Card (ABTC) coverage to non-APEC members.
2. Free and Fair Trade/Investment
The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) Agreement entered into force in 2022, and trade volume of the current 15 Members accounts for 29% of the global total. It goes without saying that the door must be kept open to future Member countries and regions so that the coverage of the Agreement could be expanded. To ensure that RCEP plays a pivotal role in trade and investment liberalization, supply chain openness and resilience, and resource/energy security, implementation of the agreement, including the prohibition of import/export restrictions, the prohibition of performance requirements, free cross-border data flow, and prohibition of data localization, must first be monitored. Also, RCEP Members should start discussing tariff elimination of goods currently excluded from trade liberalization, and acceleration of tariff elimination schedule for goods where staging category has been established.
Under the consensus of current Members, the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) should also be open to new Members, provided that the candidates are able to implement the high-level market access and rules under the Agreement, and that they have the sufficient track record of adherence to the existing rules.
The role of the WTO’s multilateral scheme remains important in achieving free trade on a global scale, and the Business Community of Asia calls for its reform and restoration. First, the dispute settlement mechanism, the last resort for rule enforcement, needs to be restored immediately. In addition, it is important to make substantive progress in the plurilateral efforts such as the Disciplines on E-commerce, and Investment Facilitation Agreement and to promote discussions on the formulation of rules to ensure the fair competition.
Governments of each economy should keep markets open and strengthen supply chain cooperation.
3. Carbon Neutrality
In order to achieve carbon neutrality on a global scale, it is essential to decarbonize Asia, which accounts for nearly half of the world’s CO2 emissions. Asia relies heavily on thermal power generation for much of its electricity, as there are limitations to scaling up in renewable energy due to unfavorable weather conditions and other restrictions, it is necessary to realize innovations, such as the development of innovative industrial processes, the use of new fuels such as hydrogen, ammonia, and synthetic fuels, and the promotion of Carbon dioxide Capture, Utilization, and Storage (CCUS) technologies, while also promoting clean energy. These innovations will unleash Asia’s economic growth while providing a stable and affordable energy supply that meets the drastic increase in electricity demand associated with the progress of electrification and the dissemination of AI. During the transition period, it is essential to promote efforts based on various pathways that take into account the circumstances of each country in cooperation, including the use of LNG as a transition fuel and the decarbonization of thermal power through co-firing of ammonia and hydrogen.
The Asian Zero Emissions Community (AZEC) concept is considered useful as a framework for such cooperation. It is also important to reduce tariffs on environmental goods and eliminate investment barriers on green infrastructure through EPAs/FTAs such as RCEP.
Furthermore, a platform for sharing environmental data could be established in each sector to ensure traceability of emissions throughout the global supply chains. Interoperability among other platforms, promotion of international standard-setting, and mutual recognition are essential on a global scale.
In addition, promoting efforts to achieve a circular economy is important to contribute to carbon neutrality.
4. Digital Transformation
Utilization of data is a prerequisite for realizing innovation, free trade/investment, and a carbon-neutral society. In order to create new added value through data analysis using generative AI, the first step is to rectify the uneven distribution of data and the resulting “digital deficit”. Promotion of Data Free Flow with Trust (DFFT) is essential in this regard. Not only should the customs duties moratorium on electronic transmissions be made permanent, but also globally interoperable rules or cross-border data flow are required in this regard. In addition, as cyber threats increase, Asia should promote capacity building, etc.
We, the Business Community of Asia, will continue to make maximum use of the Asian Business Summit to further strengthen coordination and cooperation among the economic organizations of each country and region, and call on each government to make concerted efforts to realize a more prosperous, vibrant, and attractive Asia.“
MAJECA 