Philippines better off joining conferences

THE world’s attention has been on Southeast Asia over the past couple of weeks as countries in the region hosted consequential meetings of world leaders. President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. represented the Philippines at the Asean summit in Cambodia and in the APEC forum in Thailand. In between those conferences, Indonesia hosted the G20 meeting. The Philippines does not belong to the G20, which is the group of the 20 wealthiest countries in the world, at least not yet.

Mr. Marcos hopes to lead the Philippines into becoming an upper middle-income country like Indonesia, and for that, he needs to work with the community of nations. Prosperity requires a peaceful and stable environment to bear fruit. But the world has been disrupted by a pandemic and then by the war between Ukraine and Russia that exacerbated problems in global food distribution, triggered an energy crisis and drove up inflation. As many have said, the Philippines faces external headwinds.

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In a remarkable initiative, G20 leaders condemned the war in Ukraine. “Most members strongly condemned the war in Ukraine and stressed it is causing human suffering and exacerbating existing fragilities in the global economy — constraining growth, increasing inflation, disrupting supply chains, heightening energy and food insecurity, and elevating financial stability risks,” according to the Bali declaration. “There were other views and different assessments of the situation and sanctions. Recognizing that the

G20 is not the forum to resolve security issues, we acknowledge that security issues can have significant consequences for the global economy.”

Then the other day, leaders of APEC, or the Asia-Pacific

Economic Cooperation forum, also criticized the war. Mr. Marcos told reporters that Russia and Ukraine should give peace a chance.

Russia’s president was neither in Bali nor in Bangkok. But some of his allies were there, most notably Chinese President Xi Jinping. He, too, had meetings with world leaders, including Mr. Marcos on the sidelines of the APEC conference.

Based on reports, they discussed the need to finalize a code of conduct for the South China Sea, which locals also call the West Philippine Sea. Preserving peace in the disputed territories will benefit the global economy, given the significance of the regional waters to international trade and shipping.

China’s other meetings with global leaders also helped dial down tension in the region. Most notably, Mr. Xi met with US President Joseph Biden in Bali. According to a Chinese statement, “President Xi pointed out the current state of China-US relations is not in the fundamental interest of the two countries and peoples, and is not what the international community expects. China and the United States need to have a sense of responsibility for history, for the world and for the people, explore the right way to get along with each other in the new era, put the relationship on the right course, and bring it back to the track of healthy and stable growth to the benefit of the two countries and the world as a whole.”

Besides the US and the Philippines, China also had fruitful meetings with Australia and several others. Of course, the pleasantries do not mean an end to the geopolitical problems. But they are a positive development for the Philippines and the rest of the world.

President Marcos hopes to lead the Philippines into upper middleincome status, and for that he needs to work with the community of nations. Prosperity requires a peaceful and stable environment to bear fruit.

Asean ascending

The Philippines also stands to gain from the growing importance of Asean, or the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. It has become the second most important regional grouping after the European Union.

Asean has a large population of more than 680 million people, and its collective economy is about $3 trillion. If it were a country, Asean would be the third biggest in the world in population after China and India. And collectively, Asean is fifth globally in economic size after the US, China, Japan and Germany.

Granted, Asean’s gains have been unevenly distributed, and the Philippine share of the bloc’s success has been smaller compared to the other members. Still, Filipinos are better off with Asean, as well as with APEC and other multilateral organizations.

As the saying goes, there is strength in numbers.