The year 2023 marks the 50th anniversary of formal steps toward friendship and cooperation between Japan and ASEAN. During this half century, Japan and ASEAN have deepened their economic ties, leading to successful export-led industrialization, and this relationship has contributed greatly to regional development as well as to growth of the world economy. However, it is also increasingly clear that the region now confronts many pressing economic, social, and environmental challenges, along with geopolitical uncertainty and a fragile international order. This online symposium examines what needs to be collaboratively addressed to make the regional economic growth trajectory more sustainable for both ASEAN and Japan.

The symposium will be headlined by a talk from Dr. Muhamad Chatib Basri (University of Indonesia and former Indonesian Minister of Finance). Dr. Basri’s remarks will be followed by discussion with a panel of eminent economists from ASEAN and Japan. The event will be moderated by Dr. Ian Coxhead (IDE-JETRO).

*This symposium is a part of the commemorative events of the 50th Year of ASEAN-Japan Friendship and Cooperation.

Dr. Muhamad Chatib Basri was a former Minister of Finance in Indonesia. Previously, he was the Chairman of the Indonesian Investment Coordinating Board. He is now the Co-chair of the Pandemic Fund, a newly established global fund for anticipating future pandemics, which was established by the G-20 in October 2022. He is also a member of various International Advisory councils, including the High-Level Advisory Group on Sustainable and Inclusive Recovery and Growth formed by the World Bank and the IMF in the face of a dual crisis posed by the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change; the World Bank Advisory Council on Gender and Development; Independent High-Level Expert Group on Climate Finance for COP27; Group Eminent Personalities of the OECD Development Centre; and members of the Governing Board of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore.
Since 2021, Dr. Basri has provided lectures at the Harvard Ministerial Forum to Ministers of Finance, Economic Planning, Health, and Education from all over the world to support serving ministers from developing countries to pursue their agendas for transformation. He was an Ash Center Senior Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School (2015-2016), Pacific Leadership Fellow at the Center on Global Transformation, University of California, San Diego (2016), NTUC Professor of International Economic Relation, RSIS, NTU, Singapore (2016), and Thee Kian Wie Distinguished Visiting Professor at the Australian National University (2016-2017). In Indonesia, Dr. Basri is currently the chairman of PT Bank Mandiri tbk. and the Chairman of the PT XL-Axiata tbk.
Dr. Basri has a PhD in Economics from the Australian National University. He teaches in the Department of Economics at the University of Indonesia. His expertise is in International Trade, Macroeconomics and Political Economy.

Ian Coxhead joined IDE as a senior research fellow in 2022. He is an economist specializing in the study of growth, trade and development, with a regional concentration in East and Southeast Asia. His primary research focus is on the implications of globalization and global market shocks on employment, earnings, migration, and educational choices in developing economies. His broader research interests include interactions between trade, development, natural resources and the environment. He has published widely in peer-reviewed economics journals and was editor of the Routledge Handbook of Southeast Asian Economics (2015) and co-author of The Open Economy and the Environment: Development, Trade and Resources in Asia (2003).
Professor Coxhead received his Ph.D. in Economics from the Australian National University in 1990. Prior to joining IDE, he was a faculty member in the Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA from 1991-2022 and served as department chair from 2012-2017. At UW-Madison he also served as director of the Center for Southeast Asian Studies, the Ph.D. in Development Program, and the Wisconsin Energy Institute. He is an Honorary Professor in the Arndt-Corden Department of Economics at the Australian National University.

Mr. NGUYEN Anh Duong holds a Bachelor of Economics and a Master of Economics, both from the Australian National University (Australia). In 2004, he joined the Central Institute for Economic Management (CIEM) – the leading think-tank in Viet Nam, under the Ministry of Planning and Investment. Currently being the Director of the Department for General Economic Issues and Integration Studies, Mr. Nguyen has various important research papers and policy recommendations to the Government of Viet Nam on economic integration, supply chain finance, digital economy and circular economy.
Mr. Nguyen has extensive international cooperation under various frameworks. He led the APEC Economic Committee Team to develop the Enhanced APEC Agenda for Structural Reform 2021-2025, endorsed by the 3rd APEC Structural Reform Ministerial Meeting in June 2021. Since 2019, Mr. Nguyen represents CIEM at the ASEAN+6 Regional Institute Network (RIN), coordinated by Bangkok Research Center, IDE-JETRO. He also provides support to the President of CIEM in her position as nominated member from Viet Nam to the Governing Board of the Economic Research Institute for ASEAN and East Asia (ERIA). Since 2015, Mr. Nguyen worked with the Graduate School of Public Policy – University of Tokyo to host annual Policy Research Fora (funded by Toshiba International Foundation) on different topics of relevance for Japan-Viet Nam collaboration.

Juthathip Jongwanich is an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Economics, Thammasat University, Bangkok, Thailand and Editor, Thailand and the World Economy. She won the best paper award in international economics and international macro economics from National Research Council of Thailand in 2009, 2019 and 2022 and from Thammasat University in 2018 as well as award for the highest numbers of publications in ISI and Scopus database with Impact factor (for Social Science), by Thammasat University in 2021. Her research interest is International Economics; Capital Mobility; Multinational Enterprises; International Macroeconomics and International Production Network. She works as an international consultant for various international organizations including World Bank, Asian Development Bank, Economic Research Institute of ASEAN and East Asia. She published 4 books (two in English by Routledge, NOVA Science and ISEAS, and 1 in Thai), 56 papers in leading peer-reviewed journals (such as World Development; Food Policy; World Economy; Oxford Development Studies; Review of Policy Research; Journal of Asian Economics, Applied Economics; Singapore Economic Review, Journal of South Asian Development, Journal of the Asia Pacific Economy, Asian-Pacific Economic Literature and Asian Economic Paper), and 15 book chapters for the past decade.

Dr Phouphet Kyophilavong is Professor and Dean of the Faculty of Economics and Business Management, National University of Laos. He received his PhD in economics from Kobe University in 2003 and has been carrying out research on issues including SMEs, macroeconomic management, economic integration, energy, natural resources and poverty, contributing to such publications as the International Review of Economics & Finance, Research in International Business and Finance, Economic Modelling and others. He has directed numerous research projects and works closely with government agencies in Laos and international organizations such as ERIA, OECD, Asian Development Bank, World Bank, Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA. He has been a visiting scholar at Pukyong National University, Nagoya University, University of Laval, Kobe University, and Nanyang Technological University, as well as Fulbright U.S.-ASEAN Visiting Scholar at Harvard University.

Jayant Menon joined the ISEAS - Yusof Ishak Institute as Senior Fellow to continue his work on trade and development in the Asian region, following his early retirement from the ADB in 2020. His last post at the ADB was Lead Economist in the Office of the Chief Economist. He began work life as an academic in Australia, spending almost a decade at the Centre of Policy Studies at Monash University, one of the leading centres for computable general equilibrium modelling. He has worked at several academic institutions including the University of Melbourne, Victoria University, the American University in Washington, DC and the ADB Institute in Tokyo. He has served as a Board Director of CDRI, Cambodia, and on the Advisory Board of the University of Nottingham, Malaysia. He holds adjunct appointments with the Australian National University, University of Nottingham, UK and IDEAS, Malaysia. He has authored/edited 15 books, 40 chapters in books and 80 articles in peer-reviewed journals.

So Umezaki is Director of Economic Integration Studies Group, Development Studies Center in the Institute of Developing Economies, Japan External Trade Organization (IDE-JETRO). He joined IDE in 1995, after receiving his Master's degree from the Graduate School of International Cooperation Studies (GSICS), Kobe University. During his temporary assignment to the Economic Research Institute for ASEAN and East Asia (ERIA) in Jakarta between 2008 and 2011, he contributed several flagship projects related to the economic integration in ASEAN and neighboring countries such as the Comprehensive Asia Development Plan (CADP), ASEAN-India Connectivity, and the ASEAN Strategic Transport Plan (ASTP). He has published in international journals including the Developing Economies, the Journal of Southeast Asian Economies, and Public Policy Review, and authored/edited books and book chapters on various issues related to economic integration of ASEAN and surrounding regions.

Ms. FUKUCHI Mami has been working as Director, Asia and Pacific Division, Trade Policy Bureau, Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) since July 2022. She was engaged in circular economy policy, energy policy, economic cooperation policy, diversity promotion policy in METI. She was also involved in international public relations at the Prime Minister's Office, and health and medical policy at the Cabinet Secretariat. She also worked at the Embassy of Japan in Malaysia.

She graduated from the University of Tokyo Faculty of Law in 1997 and holds a master's degree from The Fletcher School at Tufts University.