ASEAN, US agree to intensify cooperation in climate change mitigation

Jakarta (ANTARA) - The ASEAN-US Special Summit issued an ASEAN-US Joint Vision Statement stressing commitment to enhance cooperation in various strategic sectors, including pandemic recovery and climate change mitigation efforts. "As a coordinator, Indonesia chaired negotiations on a joint vision statement," Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi noted in a press statement released online on Saturday.

Under the joint efforts for pandemic recovery and regional health resilience, the summit agreed on an ASEAN-US Health Initiative Program. "The US supports the ASEAN to strengthen its infrastructure capacity in a sustainable way for essential medical products and joint researches," she remarked.

To this end, economic cooperation and connectivity were also boosted to facilitate the strengthening of a supply chain and regional connectivity for medical equipment, medicines, vaccines, and farm commodities. For climate change mitigation, both sides will allocate funds through the USASEAN Climate Future to support nationally determined contribution (NDC) in ASEAN member states.

In addition, partnership between the public and private sectors was boosted to accelerate clean energy transition through a funding scheme, blended finance, and technological transfer.

The ASEAN and the US agreed to enhance educational cooperation, including collaboration between universities and companies, through a Billion Futures Program aimed at improving educational development, teacher training, and gender mainstreaming.

Both sides also concurred on boosting maritime cooperation by strengthening coordination between law enforcement agencies in the fields of maritime domain awareness (MDA), search and rescue (SAR), maritime security, and eradication of illegal, unreported, unregulated (IUU) fishing.

The meeting also reached an in-principle agreement on promoting ASEAN-US partnership, from strategic partnership to comprehensive strategic partnership.

The ASEAN-US Special Summit brought together US President Joe Biden and ASEAN leaders, including President Joko Widodo.

"The presence of Mr President (Jokowi) at the series of meetings at the ASEAN-US Summit would hopefully strengthen concrete cooperation between the ASEAN and US to contribute to ensuring peace, stability, and prosperity in the Indo-Pacific," Marsudi stated.