PLANS to establish a single market economy for members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) are attracting European investors to move to Asia beyond China and India.

Peter Ryan, director for intellectual exchange of the Asia Europe Foundation (Asef), said providing links between the business sectors in Europe and Asia through various forums and intellectual exchange programs have significantly increased European investments in Asian region.

“With the regional economic integration of Asean, Europe is now looking to learn more on Asia, as it has been more focused recently in investing in China and India,” said Ryan in an interview with the BusinessMirror over the weekend. He said European investors have only been “scratching” the surface of Asia by pouring its resources in India and China.

Asef provides links for private stakeholders in the Asia Europe Meeting (Asem) that, in turn, consists of the 27 EU members and Asean member-countries and dialogue partners Japan, China and South Korea.

Asef conducts forums on people-to-people exchange for the Asem process; and integrates the outputs of the Asem People’s Forum that gathers civil-society groups, as well as the Asem Business Forum of investors in both regions. The integrated outputs are for final consideration in the formal Asem process.

Ryan said Asef’s people-to-people exchange programs have allowed Philippine exporters and companies to forge strategic alliances with European companies, particularly in “the areas of investments, technology transfer, as well as deepen the need for links of a lot of sectors.”

Still, he said, there is a need to reach out to the direct stakeholders in Asia and Europe in terms of providing understanding on government policies.

Meanwhile, besides the interregional links of business opportunities, Asef provides opportunities for the two regions to build strong synergies on common issues like climate change and programs to address the food-and- energy crisis.

Ryan believes that among the issues that will dominate the Asem Summit on October 24 and 25 in Beijing this year are discussions on the failure of the Doha negotiations in the World Trade Organizations, climate change and the food-and-energy crisis.

Asef’s role will be to bring the level of discussions of these issues to private-business sectors, civil-society organizations and academe in the two regions.

Ryan said the Asem process is also putting strong emphasis on developments in the adoption of the Asean charter, particularly the establishment of a regional human-rights body.

Seen as of special interest are atrocities committed against citizens of Asean members, particularly in the junta-ruled Burma/Myanmar.

The Asef is hosting early next year in Strasbourg, France, the ninth informal forum on human rights and criminal justice system for Asem member-countries. Former President of Ireland Mary Robinson is one of the guest speakers. 

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