By DAVID DIZON
Nation, 6/1/2008
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) should focus on developing the skills of workers by training them to become entrepreneurs, an official of the ASEAN Secretariat said during the 8th Biennial ASEAN Inter-University Conference on Social Development (AIUC) held in Manila.
"For human development, ASEAN member-states need to increase funding in their respective countries for human resource development and promote the use of information and communications technology," said Dr. Bounphen Philavong, assistant director of the ASEAN Secretariat's Bureau for Resources Development health and population unit.
Dr. Philavong said it is not enough that ASEAN members ensure that their workers are educated and have proper vocational training. "We need to strengthen entrepreneurship skills so that our workers have the capacity for wealth creation in their respective countries," he told abs-cbnNEWS.com.
Dr. Philavong, who hails from Laos, said ASEAN prides itself for its robust labor force, which is a great resource for each member-nation. He said proper funding for skills development would ensure that workers "will continue to bring more financial returns to the country."
He said human development is just one of the components of the ASEAN Socio-Cultural Community Blueprint, which sets out strategic thrusts and key action plans that various sectoral bodies will need to undertake until 2015 to help realize the ASEAN Community.
The other components of the blueprint are social welfare and development, social justice and rights, ensuring enviromental sustainability, building the ASEAN identity and narrowing the development gap.
Dr. Philavong said some of the activities identified under the ASEAN Socio-Cultural Community Blueprint can be done jointly at a regional level while others will be done on a country level. He said ASEAN members can also provide technical assistance to each other to ensure that activities under the socio-cultural blueprint are being done.
He said one component that is of immediate importance to ASEAN is social welfare and development, which tackles activities on poverty alleviation, meeting the Millennium Development Goals and enhancing safety nets on food security.
"Enhancing food security is very important. One example is what happened in Myanmar. In the case of natural disaster, we need to have food reserves for each nation, and not just enough reserves but ensure that the food is safe," he said.
Building the ASEAN identity
He said one issue that is covered by the ASEAN Socio-Cultural Community Blueprint is the protection of the rights of migrant workers. He said this was one of the main topics discussed during the 12th ASEAN Summit held in Cebu on January 2007.
"There are so many workers in different ASEAN countries going to each neighboring country and we need to ensure that their rights are protected. Many are abused because they go to these countries illegally so it's very difficult for them to get access to health care. They also get low salaries so we want to focus on this," he said.
In 2007, representatives of ASEAN signed an agreement that spells out the obligations of both labor-supplying and receiving countries, and calls for close monitoring for compliance by the ASEAN secretary-general. Since then, the organization has yet to finalize and implement legally-enforceable rules that would help improve the conditions of the region's migrant workforce.
Dr. Philavong said the ASEAN Secretariat is set to submit the blueprint to the ASEAN Standing Committee for approval before giving it to leaders in time for the 14th summit meeting in Thailand at the end of the year.
He also encouraged ASEAN members to ratify the ASEAN Charter by December. He said that of the 10 member-states, four -- Indonesia, Thailand, Myanmar and the Philippines - have yet to ratify the charter.
"The reasons [for not ratifying] are internal to the member-states. Maybe they need more time for endorsements from their respective parliaments. If they don't ratify, we have to work harder to convince them," he said.
The six other ASEAN members are Brunei, Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia, Singapore, and Vietnam.
