JAKARTA: With extreme weather and natural disasters becoming more common across Southeast Asian nations, ASEAN Secretary-General Kao Kim Hourn has sounded the alarm over the “urgent” challenge posed by climate change, which he said threatened the region’s safety, food security and economic resilience.
In his opening remarks at the ASEAN Day celebrations at the ASEAN Secretariat in Jakarta on Saturday, Kao said climate change was among the challenges that increasingly transcended national borders, as its effects were being felt across the region.
“Across Southeast Asia, communities are experiencing more frequent floods, droughts and extreme weather,” Kao said, as quoted from the video released by the ASEAN Secretariat.
He noted that the disasters continue to “threaten homes and livelihoods, disrupt agriculture and food security, and test the resilience of our communities and economies”.
The widespread nature of these disasters, he said, underscored the need for stronger regional cooperation, as no ASEAN member state can address the climate crisis by itself.
“The well-being of our people is increasingly shaped by challenges that no country can confront alone,” Kao said.
The warning came as Indonesia grapples with drought and land fires as it enters the peak of its dry season, including a blaze that has burned 60 hectares of Mount Bromo National Park in East Java last week.
Neighbouring countries such as Vietnam and Thailand, meanwhile, have experienced flooding caused by torrential rains in recent months.
Kao’s speech came as ASEAN marked its 59th anniversary amid geopolitical tensions that have disrupted trade routes and driven up food and energy prices, illustrating how global situations increasingly affect the region.
“National borders offer little protection from [geopolitical] consequences,” Kao said. “They remind us that many of the issues before us are shared, and that cooperation often gives us more options than acting alone.”
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Foreign Minister Sugiono echoed the call for ASEAN to make regional cooperation more impactful to ordinary people, saying the bloc’s success will ultimately be judged by whether it improves human security and livelihoods of people.
“Our farmers, our workers, our young people and our migrant workers far from home do not measure ASEAN’s success by the number of agreements we sign,” Sugiono said. “[But] by whether they can put food on the table, find decent work, live in safety and look to the future with confidence.”
To achieve this, Sugiono said the bloc must commit to strengthening food and energy security, protecting citizens during crises and equipping young people with the education and skills to lead the bloc into its next chapter.
“ASEAN itself must be equipped with stronger institutions, greater capacity and adequate resources to realise [these aspirations],” the minister said, pointing to the bloc’s 60th anniversary next year.
The ASEAN anniversary came less than three weeks after its foreign ministers met in Manila for their annual meeting on Jul. 21, where they discussed food and energy security, the green energy transition and supply-chain resilience alongside regional security issues. - Jakarta Post/ANN
