KUALA LUMPUR: Amid US tariff issues, Asean is looking to foreign business councils for stronger cooperation and advocacy with their respective governments.
A series of meetings took place with the US-Asean Business Council (USABC), EU-Asean Business Council (EU-ABC), and Asean Business Advisory Council (Asean-BAC) as part of the four-day 12th Asean Finance Ministers’ and Central Bank Governors’ Meeting (AFMGM).
"We also recognise that business councils play an important role in lobbying their various governments to do more," Finance Minister II Datuk Seri Amir Hamzah Azizan said on Wednesday (April 9) at the sidelines of the meeting.
"I think our message to the USABC is that you must help us also because you are a representative of companies in Malaysia and Asean that will face challenges if this new regime is quite difficult."
"It will also affect your companies, and we want you to represent us when you talk to the government because you know what we are doing in Asean to make businesses prosper to help you in doing business and we are always welcoming along the way."
"I think we have got support particularly from the USABC that they will also play their part to make sure that message is delivered in a better form," he added.
Amir Hamzah said with the EU-ABC, Asean is focusing more on diversification, increasing trade missions, and promoting more Free Trade Agreements (FTA).
He said Asean will also gain support particularly from the European Union in the form of technical support, financial ventures, and joint ventures on climate change.
As for the Asean-BAC, a key focus area would be facilitating inter-Asean business opportunities to spur foreign direct investments and simplifying regulations to promote the ease of doing business.
In the face of turmoil, Asean countries have come to embrace the fact that this would bring them closer together, which according to Amir Hamzah is a good sign.
He said the current affairs and the challenges in Asean were among the focuses of the meetings with business councils.
He added that Asean is still one of the better-growing regions with a lot of potential and strengthening trade within the region is the way forward, including through cross-border payment connectivity.
A meeting took place on Monday (April 7) between senior Asean officials and the United States (US) Department of the Treasury (UST) Deputy Assistant Secretary for Asia, Robert Kaproth.
Kaproth presented the policy outlook and discussed the effects of the new tariffs announcement on Asean.
The 24% tariff on goods entering the United States will begin on April 9 as Trump announced new import duties against its trading partners.
This is part of a broad trade policy targeting countries with large trade deficits with the US. However, it does not cover all Malaysian goods exported to the US.
