Warwick Asean Conference 2016

The Warwick Asean Conference is a student-led event which aims to raise awareness among Asean youth by providing a platform to identify, and discuss the current issues facing as well as exploring the broad opportunities available in Asean.

Asean is the collaboration of 10 countries from the Southeast Asia which consists of Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Brunei, Vietnam, Laos, Myanmar and Cambodia. The organisation was founded to promote political and economic cooperation and together, Asean constitute the seventh-largest economy in the world.

The first part of the conference focused on the inter-regional relations between ASEAN and the World. One key question raised was, “How should Asean foster its relationship with the US, or new emergence of economic powers such as China or India?

His Excellency Sayakane Sisouvong, the Laos Embassador to the United Kingdom commented that, “ASEAN countries are perhaps too small to be important players in the global economic as an individual, but as an integrated group of more than half a billion people, we are now in the major league. We should continue our effort in building a stronger Asean community, and keep good relationships with all other countries to broaden our opportunites.”

Historically, the relationship between the United States and the region was based mainly on bilateral ties. As Asean is becoming institutionalized, however, the United States has taken the initiative to build direct relationship with Asean. This was evidenced by Barack Obama hosting the U.S. Asean Summit at the historic Sunnylands Center in Rancho Mirage, California earlier this month.

The second part of the conference was an economic panel discussion which focused on the future economic directions of ASEAN, such as the areas of trade and economic liberalisation. The speeches and experiences shared by the speakers were truly inspiring and provided a useful insight to the audience.

Mr Yong, the coordinator of the Conference said that, “Being physically present at the conference is different as you are able to feel the spirit of Asean and the enthusiasm to create a bigger and stronger Asean Community with your peers.”

A similar comment was made by Mr Karim in his speech as one of the speaker of the Conference. “It’s the friendship that you have built today that will carry you forward.”

Mr Hazim, the co-founder of Warwick Asean Conference said that:”As the generation that will enter the workforce soon, it is crucial for us to understand not only the opportunities but also the challenges that await us.”

The Warwick ASEAN Conference definitely realized its hopes of engaging students at Warwick with the region and understanding its global influence, both economically and politically.