Honolulu, USA, 23 September 2005

by H.E. Ong Keng Yong
Secretary-General
Association of Southeast Asian Nations

Lessons learned in Partnership

The following lessons transpire from ASEAN’s partnership throughout the tsunami emergency response and recovery:

1. Rely on the neighbours - The Southeast Asian ‘sense of community’ at its best was manifested throughout the tsunami episode and the events that followed. Ultimately neighbours lent their hands to individuals, families, localities, communities, and countries that are in dire need for assistance. This happened much ahead of sophisticated and large scale helps that followed later on. Partnership among neighbouring countries has been proven to be key in ASEAN’s management of the impact of tsunami.

2. Put the chaos into order - Emergency response to the tsunami was overwhelming and unprecedented. This put everyone off guard and created enormous chaos in all quarters. ASEAN Leaders quickly put order to the chaos by calling an international summit that set the highest level coordination. ASEAN seized the moment to assert its leadership through partnership with the global community.

3. Get the priority right - Offers for assistance and partnership were in abundance and overflowing. All sprung from good motives and humanitarian intentions. These posed unique challenge to manage offers, more so in saying “NO” to the offers that did not really fit with the real need on the ground. Many of our communities and countries are getting better to influence the direction and content of offers to better fit with the prevailing priorities.

4. Knowing one’s own local fit - ASEAN has a combination of archipelagic and continent features but, by and large, it is water-based. ASEAN has learned to shape its partnership into schemes that are unique to its characteristics. Future partnership for mobilisation of emergency response assets must be suited to sea-based or river based rather than land-based.

5. Insist on strengthening while recovering - In their post-tsunami partnerships, ASEAN Member Countries – as well as ASEAN as a group - turned the tsunami disaster into opportunity to rebound the devastated community and countries as well as in better rebuilding the destroyed or damaged structures and mechanisms. As such, principles of partnership and good donorship were put to work to result in better recovery.

6. Think globally, act regionally - The tsunami brought home the stark reality that no country is an island, that global community is inevitable, and that the need for the world is to act as a global family. The tsunami has unleashed global initiatives and schemes. Through its partnership, ASEAN has taken the opportunity to reaffirm its commitment to global arrangements.

7. Strike the iron while it is hot - The international spotlight is not forever trained on to Indian Ocean and the tsunami. In its engagement with its partners, ASEAN takes this consciousness on board. It stated its preference for medium and long term partnership, investment on strengthening policy and structural framework in addition to emergency relief. All these were done with full awareness of that brief moment of global response.

What is going on in ASEAN?

1. ASEAN has adopted the ASEAN Agreement on Transboundary Haze Pollution, the first such regional arrangement in the world that binds a group of contiguous states to tackle transboundary haze pollution resulting from land and forest fires – an environmental hazard that occurs frequently in our region. In addition, there are a number of ASEAN regional agreements, such as the agreements on search and rescue for missing aircraft, for ships in distress, and for emergency rice reserve. These agreements, however, tackle issues on a sectoral basis and demonstrate fragmentation.

2. The tsunami in epic proportion devastated the fruit of hard-earned development in a matter of minutes, necessitated the mobilisation of millions of people around the world, and immense resources to respond, motivated ASEAN Member Countries to come to terms with their individual country’s vulnerability to natural disasters. In that, Member Countries have determined to implement the ASEAN Regional Programme on Disaster Management (ARPDM), and have recently signed an ASEAN Agreement on Disaster Management and Emergency Response (26 July 2005). The Agreement will put in place regional structures, mechanisms and strategies for undertaking regional cooperation on disaster management. Deliberations on regional standby arrangements and operational procedures for disaster response, which will include both military and civilian facilities, are currently ongoing. Simulation exercise to provide field reference for the development of the operational procedures and standby arrangements was held early this week (19-22 September 2005) in Malaysia.

3. The ARPDM (2004-2010) sets out a comprehensive approach in addressing various initiatives such as regional response action plan, disaster information and communication network, research and capacity building, and public awareness and education.

4. ASEAN and partners are increasing and hastening the efforts to strengthen ASEAN capacity and capability to deal with various kinds of natural, human-induced and complex disasters. Live case studies and experiences from the tsunami’s devastation are shared across the region, new initiatives are budding everywhere, and governance and management are being improved. These, however, are not without risk. ASEAN peoples are known for their being very responsive to current challenges and precisely this attitude that may render the tsunami to be a short-time currency that may lose momentum in a matter of months. Therefore, it is the challenge for all of us to seize the opportunity to strengthen, on a long-term basis, the state of disaster preparedness and prevent disaster losses.

5. Against this background, ASEAN has been working very closely amongst Member Countries, building stronger cooperation with colleagues from the United Nations family and other relevant international organisations, and cultivating closer and complementary relationship with the civil society.