Brunei Darussalam Economic Blueprint

[Monica Okane]

Oneof the strategic priorities outlined in the blueprint is promoting internationalisation of companies by facilitating and assisting local business to export their products and expand their operations overseas.

The blueprint stressed on the importance of promoting research, development and innovation to develop and adopt eco-friendly and resource-efficient technologies; and limiting land and environmental degradation in any economic development activities.

As an intergovernmental organization formed to promote regional cooperation, ASEAN moved into uncharted territory when it decided to establish the AEC. But there were building blocks. Over the years, ASEAN member states have signed economic agreements with each other to advance economic integration. These legally binding agreements include the ASEAN Trade in Goods Agreement (ATIGA), ASEAN Comprehensive Investment Agreement (ACIA), and ASEAN Trade in Services Agreement (ATISA), as well as other free trade agreements (FTAs) with major trading partners. ASEAN member states have also signed Mutual Recognition Arrangements (MRAs) to facilitate the greater movement of professionals and skilled labor in the region.

The implementation of the AEC Blueprint appears to be progressing well. The mid-term review of the AEC 2025 Blueprint, from 2016 to 2020, reported slightly more than half (54%) of its initiatives have been completed, with another 34% in progress. Unfortunately, the final year of the mid-term review in 2020 also coincided with the onset of the pandemic. Border controls, movement restrictions, and quarantine measures imposed at the height of the pandemic led to a significant drop in economic activities and domestic demand. Global supply chains were severely disrupted due to logistic bottlenecks.

Moreover, given the rapid changes in the post Covid environment, the AEC Blueprint needs to pay closer attention to new and emerging challenges faced by the region such as digital transformation (including the accelerated adoption of artificial intelligence), climate change, job upgrading, and reskilling. Looking ahead, the global economic landscape has become increasingly uncertain due to persistently high inflation, geopolitical tensions (including the war in Ukraine and US-China rivalry), and banking sector fragility. Against this backdrop, the AEC Blueprint should be fine-tuned to include more initiatives that support macroeconomic and financial stability.

The Initiative for ASEAN Integration (IAI) which was launched more than two decades ago by ASEAN to narrow the economic gap has been largely unsuccessful due to the ineffective implementation of its work plans over the years. Like the AEC Blueprint, the next IAI work plan needs to take into account the impact of the pandemic on less-developed member states and to include more relevant capacity-building initiatives, such as digital skills training and financial literacy. Growing income inequality around the world, which has been exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic, would mean that efforts to achieve economic convergence among member states should be taken more seriously by ASEAN policy-makers.

Given that the AEC deadline is just some two years away, ASEAN is unlikely to establish a EU-style common market by 2025. In fact, this was probably never the intention of ASEAN leaders when the idea of creating an economic community was mooted more than two decades ago. Even a customs union, which is the next step up the economic integration ladder, was never on the table for discussion among ASEAN policymakers.

At the same time, there is clearly unfinished work in the implementation of the AEC Blueprint and there is an urgent need to significantly revise the blueprint to capture emerging challenges facing the region. In this regard, it will be more impactful to have more frequent reviews of the AEC Blueprint to fine-tune targets and introduce new initiatives. The ASEAN Secretariat should also be given more resources to monitor the progress in implementing the blueprint.

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Prior to taking up his current appointment as Senior Research Fellow at Singapore's Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, Dr Denis Hew was Director of the APEC Policy Support Unit (PSU) from 2011 to 2022. PSU is the research arm of the APEC, which is a regional grouping that promotes trade and investment liberalisation and facilitation in the Asia-Pacific region.

In a statement, the MoFE said the success of the economic blueprint will help Brunei Darussalam to move from a highly dependent oil and gas economy to a dynamic and sustainable one with high-value job opportunities, harnessing the latest technology in line with the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR).

In achieving the objectives, four main macroeconomic goals are intended: high and sustainable economic growth unaffected by economic uncertainties; economic diversification to increase the contribution sectors beyond oil and gas; macroeconomic stability which includes moderate inflation, fiscal sustainability and trade surplus; and low unemployment rate.

In ensuring that the goals will be achieved, six aspirations have been identified in the economic blueprint: productive and vibrant businesses; skilled, adaptable and innovative people; open and globally connected economy; sustainable environment; high quality and competitive economic infrastructure; and good governance and public service excellence.

I heard these words spoken by Nadia, a sixth-former, when, as chair of the Commission on Social Justice, colleagues and I visited her school in the East End of London. It is probably a more articulate summary of our views on the fundamental importance of learning than I could muster.

The commission has set out a radical blueprint for a better Britain. We argue that social justice and economic prosperity should -- indeed must, if we are to have either -- go together. And ambitious reforms to our education and training systems are at the centre of our project.

Fifty years ago, path-breaking reports from William Beveridge and Rab Butler reshaped the welfare and education systems. Since then we have witnessed three revolutions, which have rendered obsolete old notions of welfare, work and learning.

There has been an economic revolution, driven by growing international competition and job-shedding technology; a social revolution resulting from women's rapidly changing life-chances and changes in family structure; and a political revolution which stems from the breakdown and marginalisation of old forms of governance -- "the end of deference".

All of these revolutions demand a commitment to lifelong learning. For individuals, as well as companies and countries, education and training are the foundations of economic security -- a security which comes from skills for life, not jobs for life.

When one in ten jobs "dies" each year; when the shelf life of skills has halved in 20 years; when our skills base is the most important determinant of national success in an international economy, "thinking for a living" is not a choice but an imperative.

The United Kingdom is failing to meet these challenges. We are way behind our competitors in terms of entry rates to higher education. We are also behind in training, at the crucial 16-19 stage, and in pre-school education. The commission tackles them all: but I want to concentrate on our proposals for expanding higher education, and for making a reality of the rhetoric of "lifelong learning".

British universities have always provided a world class education for a small number of people. And in recent years the numbers entering higher education has gone up, which of course we welcome. But doing better is not good enough when others set their sights far higher.

Further expansion of higher education is unworkable with the current system of funding, which is already buckling under the strain of higher participation -- as this year's freeze on tuition fees for institutions which "over-shoot" on numbers so graphically demonstrates. We desperately need a new, fairer system for funding higher education.

Along with the National Commission on Education, we believe that those who do best out of higher education -- in terms of earnings -- should contribute to the cost of that education in order to allow others to enjoy the same benefits. Our proposed system of higher education contributions would cover maintenance and a proportion of average tuition costs, and be run through the national insurance system.

But -- unlike the current system of student loans -- repayments would be genuinely sensitive to a graduate's income. Entry to higher education must be on the basis of the ability to learn, not ability to pay.

A carefully-designed system of graduate contributions would not, we believe, deter potential students from poorer backgrounds. The introduction of a similar scheme in Australia has had no impact on the background of entrants. And the real barrier to higher education is an insufficient supply of places -- and only radical reform of the funding structure, along the lines we suggest, will allow faster expansion.

A fairer funding system would remove the inequalities between different types of course, which leave part-timers at a disadvantage. But our present funding system is not keeping even full-time students out of poverty. The combination of an eroded grant and student loan is not providing an adequate income. For those who choose to study full-time, more generous maintenance should be available -- but should be paid back after graduation if earnings are high enough.

Churning out more graduates is not the beginning and end of a radical education strategy, however. We must become used to the idea of learning throughout life: at work; in combination with part-time work; between periods of paid work; and from home through computer links.

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