First ASEAN Economic Ministers Meeting (1975)

The Meeting of ASEAN Economic and Planning Ministers was held in Jakarta on 26-27 November 1975 to prepare the groundwork for the forthcoming Meeting of Heads of Government of the five ASEAN member states. The Meting was preceded by a meeting of ASEAN Senior Economic and Planning Officials in Jakarta on 22-25 November 1975.
The Meeting was attended by H.E. Datuk Hamzah bin Datuk Aba Samah, the Minister of Trade and Industry of Malaysia; H.E. Dr, Gerardo Sicat, Secretary of Economic Planning and H.E. Vicente Paterno, Secretary of Industry of the Philippines; H.E. Hon Sui Sen, the Minister for Finance of Singapore and H.E. Lee Khoon Choy, the Senior Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, of Singapore; H.E. Preeda Patanathabutr, the Minister attached to the Prime Minister of state Office of Thailand, and H.E. Widjojo Nitisastro, the Minister of State for Economic, Financial and Industrial Affairs/Chairman of the National Development Planning Agency, and H.E. Radius Prawiro, the Minister of Trade of Indonesia and their respective delegations.
H.E. President Soeharto of the Republic of Indonesia declared the Meeting officially open. In his Opening Address, he enjoined the ASEAN member countries to adopt pragmatic approaches to ASEAN economic cooperation which would take into account the differences in the stages of development of the member countries. He also stated that the aim of economic cooperation should be to facilitate the development efforts in enhancing national as well as regional resilience.
H.E. President Soeharto emphasized that ASEAN must be capable of not only making the region viable economically, but also concretely contributing to the solution of world economic problems. He stated that economic resilience of each member country should be strengthened in view of the would economic crisis in food. Cooperation in the supply and production of staple food should be accelerated in order to increase food production in the whole region. The President stressed that the long term objective of increasing the food production within the ASEAN. member states is to prevent our region from becoming dependent on other regions of the world as far as food is concerned. On the contrary, he said, it should become a region capable of contributing to the solution of world food problems.
The President further stated that the principles applied to food are also valid for the cooperation with regard to the energy crisis. He reiterated that a close cooperation of this nature for the supply and production of energy will directly solidify the region's economic resilience in view of the world energy crisis.
The President expressed the hope that the present Meeting of ASEAN Economic and Planning Ministers would formulate concrete measures that can be undertaken immediately.
H.E. Widjojo Nitisastro and H.E. Datuk Hamzah bin Datuk Abu Samah- were elected Chairman and Vice Chairman of the Meeting respectively.
The Ministers exchanged views on the ways and means to accelerate ASEAN economic cooperation through mutual assistance, and active collaboration. They identified various areas in which the ASEAN member countries could cooperate to strengthen the economic resilience of the individual countries and of ASEAN and accordingly agreed on various specific recommendations to be submitted to their respective Government for eventual consideration of the ASEAN Heads of Government their forth coming Summit Meeting.
The Ministers expressed their deep appreciation to till Government and people of the Republic of Indonesia particularly to H.E. President Soeharto for the hospitality extended to the delegations and for the excellent arrange- ments made for the meeting.
The Meeting held in the traditional spirit ASEAN friendship and cooperation.