Fear and anxiety will compete alongside hope and success in the zone as the Indo-Pacific region reaches new thresholds of population growth and inequality, according to Former Indonesian President His Excellency Dr Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.
In his keynote address at the In the Zone 2016: Feeding the zone conference in Jakarta today, Dr Yudhoyono said the International Monetary Fund (IMF) had predicted a bleak outlook for the world’s economy, where half of the world’s wealth was now owned by just one percent of people.
He said although South East Asian economies were growing at higher rates than any other, it was imperative that the Indonesian government maintained a focus on high economic growth despite the predicted slow down of global food production and the challenges presented by urbanisation and more people leaving the agricultural sector to find employment in other industries.
Food wastage totaling about USD70 billion per year and was another area needing strong attention as leaders became increasingly more puzzled as to how the world population would feed itself in the future.
Dr Yudhoyono was hopeful however that through regional co-operation and innovation the zone had the means to meet the needs of global food production.
The complex and challenging issue of ‘Feeding the Zone’ is the subject of a one-day discussion in Jakarta, Indonesia today as part of the Perth USAsia Centre’s In the Zone 2016 event, in partnership with the Foreign Policy Community of Indonesia. More than 1000 delegates from government, business and academia have convened to discuss strategic solutions to food and water security in the Indo-Pacific zone.
In the Zone was founded by The University of Western Australia (UWA) in 2009 and remains Western Australia’s premier forum on questions of regional significance, bringing together governments, businesses and policy makers for important collaborative dialogue and strategic solution building.
The premise of In the Zone is that Western Australia shares a time zone with 60 per cent of the world’s population and the nations that promise the greatest economic growth of the twenty-first century.
Previous conference themes have discussed: Crisis, Opportunity and the New World Order (2009); The Geography of Global Prosperity (2011 & 2012); A New Narrative of Prosperity and Power (2014); Capital Ideas for the 21st Century (2015).
In 2015, In the Zone presented a one-day event in Singapore as part of a Venture Asia initiative to bring the regional discussion into Asia.
Feeding the Zone is the theme of the 2016 In the Zone forum and continues positioning this important forum in Asia (Jakarta, Indonesia).
The Perth USAsia Centre, based at The University of Western Australia, is a non-partisan, not-for-profit institution promoting stronger relationships between Australia, the Indo-Pacific and the USA by contributing to strategic thinking, policy development and enhanced networks between government, the private sector and academia. The Perth USAsia Centre is pleased to present In the Zone 2016 in partnership with the Foreign Policy Community of Indonesia.
Feeding the Zone is being streamed live by webcast. To follow the discussion: http://ift.tt/1qqdC8D
Media references
Sonia Nolan, Media Manager, In the Zone 2016
Fear and anxiety will compete with hope and success in zone's race for food
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