Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Nguyen Quoc Dung, head of Vietnam’s SOM ASEAN, speaks at the dialogue. (Photo: VNA)

Held by the ASEAN Secretariat, the dialogue aimed to collect opinions on the building of the bloc’s master plan on pandemic response and post-pandemic recovery, as requested by ASEAN leaders at the 36th ASEAN Summit in June.

It brought together hundreds of delegates from ASEAN member countries and regional and international organisations.

Dung, who is also Chairman of the ASEAN Coordinating Council Working Group on Public Health Emergencies (ACCWG-PHE), suggested economic recovery work should be done in steps with clear focuses, concentrating on production, tourism, and transport, with more attention to be paid to disadvantaged groups.

He stressed the need to ensure the dual goals of containing the pandemic while rapidly recovering economic activities.

As ACCWG-PHE Chairman, Dung called for the involvement from the private sector, international organisations, and ASEAN partners in the building of the plan, first of all the draft plan framework.

The master plan, which will be constantly updated, is scheduled to be submitted to the 37th ASEAN Summit in November.

At the dialogue, experts from the World Bank (WB), the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), and the World Economic Forum (WEF) pointed to a gloomy economic outlook for the region and the world.

Given this, they stressed the significance of coordination between countries and sectors in pandemic response as well as economic recovery.

They proposed prioritising such areas as healthcare, social welfare, education, food security, and high-quality infrastructure, adding that digital technology and the application of Industry 4.0 play an important role./. VNA

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