Latest news with #DEFA
The Star
28-06-2025
- Business
- The Star
Miti supports young entrepreneus through DEFA, Asean SME Academy, says Tengku Zafrul
KUALA LUMPUR: The Investment, Trade and Industry Minister is actively creating more space for young entrepreneurs to thrive, in line with Malaysia's role as Asean chair, says its Minister Tengku Datuk Seri Zafrul Abdul Aziz. infographic He said that through initiatives such as the Asean SME Academy and the Digital Economy Framework Agreement (DEFA), the ministry is breaking down barriers so that these entrepreneurs can start, scale, and connect their ventures beyond borders. "DEFA, the world's first regional digital economy treaty, is projected to grow Asean's digital economy to over US$2 trillion by 2030 and generate millions of jobs. These are not just statistics; they are doorways to your future," he said in his closing keynote address at the Nusantara Youth Forum 2025 held in Putrajaya Saturday (June 28). Tengku Zafrul said that as Malaysia opens doors for young entrepreneurs and innovators, it is important to mention how Malaysia's own long-term strategies align with these regional ambitions. "Through the New Industrial Master Plan 2030 (NIMP 2030), Malaysia is transforming our industrial landscape by focusing on high value-added sectors, advanced manufacturing, and future-oriented skills. "NIMP's core mission is to create quality jobs and ensure our industries - especially in electrical and electronics (and) green tech - remain globally competitive, resilient, and sustainable," he said. According to the minister, national frameworks such as NIMP are not just about Malaysia's progress. "They also complement Asean initiatives like DEFA and the Asean SME Academy, creating a seamless ecosystem that supports youth, from upskilling and financing to market access, so you can truly take your ideas from the region to the world," he said. Tengku Zafrul also gave recognition to arts and culture, saying that too often, the creative sector is wrongly treated as secondary to the "main economy". "The truth is, culture and creativity are economic engines, identity builders and bridges between nations," he said, adding that Asean's creative industries, from music to film, are gaining global attention. The Minister said he cannot overstate the importance of entrepreneurship in driving both economic progress and social transformation. "Today, the most exciting businesses in Malaysia, and indeed throughout Asean, are being founded, led, and grown by youths. "Whether you are developing tech solutions, running sustainable farms, designing innovative products, or launching platforms for social impact, you show the world what is possible when ambition is united with purpose," he added. - Bernama
The Sun
28-06-2025
- Business
- The Sun
MITI boosts young entrepreneurs via DEFA and ASEAN SME Academy
KUALA LUMPUR: The Ministry of Investment, Trade and Industry (MITI) is expanding opportunities for young entrepreneurs, leveraging Malaysia's ASEAN chairmanship to foster cross-border business growth. Minister Tengku Datuk Seri Zafrul Abdul Aziz highlighted key initiatives like the ASEAN SME Academy and the Digital Economy Framework Agreement (DEFA) as pivotal in breaking barriers for startups. Speaking at the Nusantara Youth Forum 2025 in Putrajaya, Tengku Zafrul emphasised DEFA's potential to elevate ASEAN's digital economy to over US$2 trillion by 2030. 'These are not just statistics; they are doorways to your future,' he said, underlining the treaty's role in job creation and regional connectivity. Malaysia's New Industrial Master Plan 2030 (NIMP 2030) further aligns with these goals, prioritising high-value sectors like advanced manufacturing and green technology. 'NIMP's mission is to ensure our industries remain competitive and sustainable,' he added, noting its synergy with ASEAN-wide programmes for youth upskilling and market access. Tengku Zafrul also championed the creative economy, dismissing its marginalisation as outdated. 'Culture and creativity are economic engines,' he said, citing ASEAN's rising global influence in music and film. He lauded young entrepreneurs driving innovation across tech, agriculture, and social impact sectors, stating, 'You show the world what's possible when ambition meets purpose.'
Forbes
19-06-2025
- Business
- Forbes
How And Why The Future Of Geopolitics Is Playing Out In Southeast Asia
For Malaysia, 2025 was supposed to be the year it demonstrated it could lead not just at home but across one of the world's most diverse and diplomatically fragile regions. As chair of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), it had the rotating responsibility of setting the agenda, shaping regional priorities and projecting leadership in a moment of rising global uncertainty. It was an opportunity Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim appeared to embrace. When I met him last year, he spoke of regional leadership as both duty and opportunity. Speaking in Vientiane at the ASEAN Summit late last year, he laid out a vision centered on digital transformation, economic resilience and collective reinvention. The theme for the year, 'inclusivity and sustainability,' signaled a desire to lead with both principle and pragmatism. Now, six months into the chairmanship, as the summits settle into memory and the press statements fade from view, a more complex story is emerging. Malaysia's leadership of ASEAN has produced meaningful economic momentum but also exposed the structural limitations of the organization itself. The challenge for Anwar was not only steering a multilateral ship through stormy waters but doing so while ASEAN's engine showed signs of stalling. On the economic front, Malaysia's chairmanship has been one of the most active in years. Under Anwar's leadership, ASEAN prioritized the long-delayed Digital Economy Framework Agreement (DEFA), a sweeping initiative to create harmonized rules around e-commerce, digital payments, cybersecurity and data governance. DEFA had been under negotiation for years but Malaysia made it a political priority, pushing through a shared roadmap and narrowing gaps on standards. This approach aligns with Joseph Nye's conception of soft power leadership, where values, attraction and institutional influence are used rather than coercion or capital to shape preferences. In a region of contrasting regimes—democratic, authoritarian and hybrid—Malaysia acted as an agenda-setter through persuasion, embedding liberal economic coordination as a regional value. DEFA also illustrated what liberal institutionalism calls functional spillover. By integrating economies through digital infrastructure, Malaysia aimed to generate momentum that could extend into greater political cohesion. With U.S. and China competition accelerating and global trade patterns shifting, ASEAN's digital integration has become a lifeline for small and medium enterprises in Indonesia, Vietnam, the Philippines and Malaysia itself. The goal, as articulated by Anwar, was to turn ASEAN's economic interdependence into strategic alignment. Even in its successes, the chairmanship underscored a difficult truth. The easier ASEAN's agenda, the less strategically transformative its impact. Digital harmonization is welcome but also the least controversial path. It does not provoke and that is partly why it progresses. There were few risks taken and even fewer uncomfortable decisions made. That was by design. It was also a tacit acknowledgment of what could not be solved. In Myanmar, the failure of ASEAN diplomacy became increasingly hard to ignore. Since the 2021 military coup, the country has descended into a deepening civil conflict with no clear end in sight. Malaysia attempted to reinvigorate regional mediation by appointing seasoned diplomat Othman Hashim as ASEAN's special envoy. It also helped shift the conversation from legitimacy—whether elections organized by the junta should be recognized—to survival: whether a ceasefire could even be secured. This shift aligns with Ronald Heifetz's theory of adaptive leadership, where leaders focus not on offering false solutions but on reframing problems. Malaysia sought to reposition ASEAN's role not as an arbitrator of constitutional legitimacy but as a humanitarian broker trying to limit further collapse. It was a subtle but important pivot in tone and responsibility. Yet even adaptive leadership has limits without leverage. The junta continued its military campaign unabated. The Five-Point Consensus, ASEAN's diplomatic centerpiece, remained stalled. The bloc's decision to bar junta representation at key meetings stayed in place but produced little change. Malaysia offered moral clarity, a public commitment to peace over procedural pretense. But institutionally, ASEAN lacked the tools to match that clarity with consequence. Here, Malaysia's efforts revealed the bind of ethical leadership in a realist system. Moral persuasion alone does not alter the incentives of actors who hold power through force. Malaysia elevated the regional narrative on Myanmar but in structural terms, it was diplomacy without teeth. Then there is the South China Sea, where Malaysia's approach revealed both strategic caution and geopolitical restraint. Tensions between China and the Philippines flared repeatedly in early 2025, with maritime standoffs and allegations of aggression becoming near-regular occurrences. ASEAN's Code of Conduct (COC), in development for over three decades, remains unfinished. Malaysia helped frame the third reading of the draft as progress but insiders acknowledged the COC remains largely symbolic. From a realist perspective, this is a case of balancing without alliance. ASEAN states, including Malaysia, are engaging in what scholars like Stephen Walt describe as hedging, preserving autonomy by avoiding overt alignment with any single great power. Malaysia's chairmanship helped maintain this equilibrium by avoiding escalatory language while keeping diplomatic channels to Beijing open. It was a leadership style defined by strategic ambiguity. While some criticized it as too passive, it also reflected an understanding of regional vulnerabilities. China is ASEAN's largest trading partner. It dominates infrastructure finance, technology investment and increasingly, soft cultural capital. For Malaysia, antagonizing Beijing would have undermined its own development strategy. Leadership in this context became an exercise in containment through diplomacy, not deterrence. Malaysia's Foreign Minister Mohamad Hasan underscored the enduring logic of ASEAN's posture. 'ASEAN must stay united amid great power rivalry and transnational threats,' he told me in an email. He pointed to the ASEAN Political-Security Community Strategic Plan 2045 and ASEAN Vision 2045 as the anchors of long-term cooperation in areas such as cybercrime, transnational crime and emerging technologies. In his view, ASEAN's continued commitment to neutrality, dialogue and cooperation has helped the region maintain peace, foster trust and keep communication channels open. That steadiness, he argued, is what makes ASEAN's approach both distinct and resilient. What Malaysia's year made clear is that ASEAN cannot outmaneuver China with declarations. Nor can it enforce discipline internally when economic interests diverge. The chair did what was possible, coordinate, deflect and preserve cohesion. From a statecraft perspective, it was realist diplomacy with limited tools and modest aims. Complicating matters is the return of Donald Trump to the U.S. presidency. While ASEAN has historically tried to hedge between Washington and Beijing, the second Trump administration has made that calculus harder. Trump's transactional style, his disdain for multilateralism and his near-total disinterest in Southeast Asia have left regional leaders scrambling for relevance. Malaysia, meanwhile, has been diversifying further from Washington. Its open criticism of U.S. policy in Gaza and its application for BRICS membership mark a notable pivot. Earlier this year, Anwar's administration denounced Trump's floated plan to relocate Palestinians from Gaza, a move that galvanized domestic support but chilled diplomatic ties. At the ASEAN level, Malaysia proposed a joint condemnation of the plan. Predictably, it failed. ASEAN's rule of unanimity ensures that lowest-common-denominator diplomacy often prevails. Once again, Malaysia sought to assert moral leadership within a structure that resists moral consensus. Still, Malaysia's moves signal a slow but steady realignment of Southeast Asian strategy. There is less ideological loyalty to the West and more diversified engagement with the Global South. From a grand strategy perspective, this is not a rupture but an evolution. In the absence of consistent U.S. engagement, Malaysia and its neighbors are pursuing strategic pluralism that reflects a multipolar world. So how should Malaysia's chairmanship be remembered? It delivered tangible progress on digital integration, sharpened the language of diplomacy around Myanmar and maintained regional coherence in the face of rising tension. Anwar positioned Malaysia as a credible convener, capable of articulating shared values even when outcomes fell short. His administration approached leadership not as domination but as facilitation. At the same time, the chairmanship highlighted ASEAN's deeper drift. Structural weakness in crisis response, strategic inertia in security and institutional caution in the face of authoritarian breakdowns all remained visible. Malaysia could not transform ASEAN because ASEAN does not permit transformation. In that way, Malaysia's year at the helm was not a failure. It was a mirror. It reflected what ASEAN has become, a necessary institution that is not yet a decisive one. And it reflected what regional leadership requires in 2025, the ability to work within constraint, adapt to disorder and lead with clarity even when the system resists coherence. Anwar did not reshape the region. But he led it with intelligence, restraint and purpose. That is a form of strategic success worth acknowledging.
The Sun
05-06-2025
- Business
- The Sun
Malaysia brings ASEAN voice to OECD meeting in Paris
KUALA LUMPUR: ASEAN, which is chaired by Malaysia this year, has expressed full support for all efforts to strengthen open markets and uphold a rules-based multilateral trading system as the foundation for sustainable and inclusive global growth. The Permanent Representative of Malaysia to the World Trade Organisation (WTO), Ambassador Syahril Syazli Ghazali said the ASEAN chairmanship's theme 'Inclusivity and Sustainability' reflects Malaysia's priority in promoting a fair, sustainable and inclusive trade. 'In addressing the emerging global headwinds and uncertainties, ASEAN Geoeconomics Task Force (AGTF) was established to monitor, assess and recommend policy responses to strengthen ASEAN – as a single market,' he said in a statement to Bernama today. Syahril Syazli represented Malaysia at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Ministerial Council Meeting (MCM) held from June 3 to 4 in Paris. Malaysia is also spearheading various initiatives to build a digitally resilient ASEAN, in particular, driving the ASEAN Digital Economy Framework Agreement (DEFA) negotiations, towards substantial conclusion by the end of this year. 'DEFA is a cornerstone in facilitating and promoting the 'inclusivity' of ASEAN, and ensuring the region will continue to enjoy digital trade benefits,' he said. On empowering micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) as well as women, Syahril Syazli said Malaysia is fostering digital skills for women entrepreneurs via national programmes such as EmpowerHER Digital and Women Exporters Development Programme, aimed to integrate more women-led businesses into the international value chain. 'The landmark initiative to establish ASEAN's first Women's Economic Empowerment Centre in Kuala Lumpur, announced last month, would further enhance the role of women in economic development as well as promote inclusive growth in the region,' he added.
New Straits Times
04-06-2025
- Business
- New Straits Times
Snowflake can play important role in Asean's DEFA
SAN FRANCISCO: US-based cloud company Snowflake said it could play an important part in the Asean Digital Economy Framework Agreement (DEFA) as the bloc's member countries aim to conclude negotiations by the end of this year. Its Asean managing director, Satchit Joglekar, said Snowflake has always focused on building ecosystems, especially with the connectedness inherent in its artificial intelligence (AI) data cloud that ensures companies across Asean — not just within a single country like Singapore or Indonesia — have a connected ecosystem that also extends from their supply chains to how they serve their customers. "These ecosystems can cut across multiple Asean countries, encompassing both customers and suppliers. Our core mission has been to enable this connectedness securely and in a governed fashion. "This allows data to be leveraged through our connected, secure data cloud to unlock value within that ecosystem, whether through data-sharing relationships or by building and distributing applications on our marketplaces. "This approach is aligned with the company's vision to build a connected ecosystem that is not specific to each country or a particular conglomerate but extends it across the entire digital ecosystem in Asean," he told Bernama on the sidelines of the Snowflake Summit 2025 held at Moscone Centre here. Satchit added that Snowflake can also play a significant role in enabling the community. Pointing out that a key strength of Asean is its large and growing young population emerging from educational institutions, he said the company is actively pursuing partnerships with institutions of higher learning in the major economies where it invests and has a presence. He said by introducing concepts like the AI Data Cloud, connectedness and data ecosystems, for example, at the earliest levels, students can leverage them in their careers whilst at the same time, consistently engaging with communities of data engineers, data scientists and data professionals, ensuring they are up to speed with the latest advancements in the ecosystem. Satchit said this could lead the communities in the data ecosystem to unlock value for their companies, country and the future of the Asean digital economy. "The DEFA continues to be a pivotal step for the grouping, not just in embracing the digital economy but helping to define its future. With negotiations set to conclude by 2025, the time for businesses to act is now. Those who prepare early will be best positioned to lead," he said. The DEFA, which aims to provide a comprehensive roadmap to empower businesses and stakeholders across Asean, is expected to create its own history by becoming the world's first region-wide digital economy and legally binding agreement. The agreement is expected to focus on key areas such as cross-border e-commerce, cyber security, digital trade, digital ID and digital payments and new emerging areas like AI. According to Boston Consulting Group, Asean's digital economy is projected to triple by the end of the decade through the natural adoption of digital technologies, growing to almost US$1 trillion (US$1 = RM4.24) by 2030 from about US$300 billion to date, and with DEFA, it could double the value contribution, unlocking US$2 trillion to Asean's digital economy. -- BERNAMA
