18 February 2015 – Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Senior Officials re-affirmed their commitment to APEC’s capacity-building, and economic and technical cooperation pillar at the recently concluded First APEC Senior Officials’ Meeting and Related Meetings, held from January 26 to February 07 at the Clark and Subic Freeport Zones.
Guided by the APEC 2015 priority of “Investing in Human Capital Development”, Senior Officials and APEC technical working groups emphasized the need to place human capacity building at the fore of APEC’s work this year particularly on initiatives related to health, women, education, science and technology, and people-to-people connectivity.
The various APEC sub-fora working on projects and programs related to human capital development reported the following developments:
Health and Women
The Health Working Group (HWG) and the Policy Partnership on Women and the Economy (PPWE) are coming together to put focus on the health and well-being of women, and migrants in the Asia-Pacific region within the context of strengthening health systems and health industry development. In 2015, the HWG and PPWE will jointly discuss the next steps of the Women and the Economy Dashboard which is a scorecard with 75 indicators drawn from a range of international data sources (e.g. access to healthcare, access to capital and financing, educational attainment, etc.) pertaining to the status of women and the economy in the APEC region so that policymakers have a clear picture of gaps and opportunities.
Human Capacity Building through Education, and Science and Technology
A preparatory meeting for the High Level Policy Dialogue on Human Capacity Building (HLPD-HCB) was held in Subic Freeport Zone from February 02 to 04 as a lead up to the main event on 06-07 May 2015 in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea.
The pre-meeting, chaired by the Philippine Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) Deputy Director General, Irene M. Isaac,discussed the two-day program where key industry players, academe and government will share best practices in developing a 21st century-ready workforce, aligning education to industry needs, and enhancing productivity of SMEs.
The above themes recall the discussion at the Informal Senior Officials’ Meeting (ISOM) last December in Manila, which emphasized how growth coupled with equality of opportunity is necessary to close the human capital gap, as well as the need to respond to the challenges brought by new technologies that increase the speed and complexity of knowledge and information flows.
Aside from the pre-meeting, APEC Senior Officials also welcomed the official launch of the APEC Scholarship Initiative, which “promotes the creation of privately and publicly funded APEC-branded scholarship, training, and internship opportunities to benefit students and professionals, especially youth and women.” This initiative supports APEC Leaders’ target of one million intra-APEC university-level students per year by 2020. Philippine universities have already signed up to join the program.
People-to-People Connectivity
Complimenting the cross-border movement of students, APEC also welcomed the extension of the validity of the APEC Business Travel Card from three to five years, as well as the initiative to advance regional connectivity by connecting “remote areas” to the economic centers of the region through air, maritime and land infrastructure that allow reliable supply chain and logistics flows.
These discussions will be elevated to the High-Level Policy Dialogue on Human Capacity Building in May, the High-Level Policy Dialogue on Science and Technology in Higher Education in July, and the Women and Economy meeting in September. END