Remarks By H.E. Cho Tae-yul
Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Korea
At The 11th East Asia Forum

August 21, 2013
Kyoto, Japan

H.E. Vice Minister Suzuki, Distinguished Delegates, Ladies and Gentlemen,

It is a great honor and privilege for me to address the 11th East Asia Forum that is taking place in this beautiful and time-honored city of Kyoto. First of all, I would like to congratulate the Government of Japan on the excellent preparations for this important conference.

Since its inception in 2003, the East Asia Forum has served as a premier forum for intellectual discourse among the representatives of government, business, and academia from the ASEAN+3 countries and has provided the way forward in building the East Asian community. Today I am pleased to share with you some of my thoughts on how to promote people-to-people connectivity in the region, the main theme of the Forum this year.

East Asia’s Rise and Regional Integration

Without a doubt, East Asia is the fastest growing region in the world that is full of economic dynamism. During the Cold War era, East Asia was an arena of intense ideological confrontation and rivalry, but since the early 1990s a wind of change has swept over the entire region.

ASEAN, in particular, has rapidly expanded its membership and further accelerated its integration process. As a result, ASEAN is now evolving into one of the most dynamically integrated regional entities and the international community is keeping a close eye on the process of its evolution.

Northeast Asia has also witnessed an enormous change both in scope and in nature, especially in terms of trilateral cooperation among China, Japan and Korea. In order to realize the immense potential for trilateral cooperation, governments of the three countries launched a trilateral FTA negotiation in 2012. The Trilateral Cooperation Secretariat (TCS) was also established in Seoul a year before and a variety of activities and programs have been underway to broaden and deepen the cooperative partnership among the three countries.

All of these developments have been possible because the leaders of the region had an eye for reading the global trend of the times and shared the vision for the future. The first-ever ASEAN+3 Summit in 1997 was their joint response to the parallel development of globalism and regionalism in the post-Cold War era. A whole range of economic indicators show how wise a decision they made at that time.

The pace of economic growth of the ASEAN+3 countries has been impressive indeed. Back in 1990, the combined GDP and trade volume of the ASEAN+3 countries accounted for 18 percent and 13 percent of the global GDP and trade volume. By 2011, it had increased to 23 percent and 24 percent, respectively.

According to an ADB report, the ASEAN+3 countries’ share of global GDP is projected to surpass that of the U.S. and Europe in 2014 and 2020, respectively. Moreover, East Asia’s vibrant economy has contributed to overcoming the global financial crisis in 2008. Undoubtedly, East Asia has now transformed itself into one of the major pillars sustaining the global economy.

In tandem with this, the scope of the ASEAN+3 cooperation has broadened rapidly to encompass around 20 areas ranging from finance, agriculture, health, education, to natural disaster. Indeed, the ASEAN+3 cooperation has developed beyond the routine consultations between the governments, and is now heading towards regional integration with a shared vision of building a safe and economically vibrant community of nations.

Enhancing People-to-People Connectivity: an Answer to Overcome Diversity

And yet, the region is characterized by diversity in religion, language, culture and history. There are also income and development gaps among nations in the region. Some people argue that such diversity may hinder East Asian regional integration. However, this does not have to be the case. While EU is a good example of integration of countries sharing abundant similarities and commonalities, there are also other cases of integration successfully achieved while safeguarding diversity and pluralism. The U.S. is a case in point.

Therefore, what is needed is a joint effort to find common ground and shared values while respecting one another’s different culture, tradition and history. The enhanced people-to-people connectivity will contribute to overcoming potential problems arising from diversity in the region and fostering a greater sense of community as well as regional identity.

The importance of strengthening people-to-people connectivity is already highlighted in the report of the East Asia Vision Group II in its recommendations for the future direction of the ASEAN+3 cooperation. ASEAN also underlined people-to-people connectivity as a key tool in building an ASEAN community by 2015.

Enhancing People-to-People Connectivity through Tourism

Distinguished Delegates,

Tourism, the main topic of today’s discussions, can be the most effective tool for fostering a sense of connectivity as it is driven by spontaneous and natural interest of individuals. Tourism has great potential not only to contribute to promoting people-to-people connectivity, but also to improving physical and institutional connectivity.

For example, in order to promote tourism, transportation infrastructure including air, railroad and marine transport must be expanded and a system that caters to prompt immigration and customs clearance should also be developed. The former enhances physical connectivity, and the latter promotes institutional connectivity. In fact, physical and institutional connectivity are functional preconditions for promoting people-to-people connectivity.

Tourism infrastructure in East Asia such as transportation, accommodation and the ICT has been steadily improving, adding to increased intra-regional tourism. Moreover, the growth of the middle class is giving rise to greater demand for tourism in the region. It is against this backdrop that the UNWTO indicated that the tourism industry in East Asia has potential for further development.

Let me give you an example from Korea. Jeju Island, located south of the Korean peninsula, has become one of the most popular wedding destinations for Chinese couples, and tens of thousands of other Asian tourists are visiting Korea every day to see for themselves the origins of the Korean Wave or Hallyu. My government sees this as a way to promote the image of Korea as a nation with unique and rich culture and, at the same time, as an opportunity to communicate with citizens of other Asian countries. The number of Koreans traveling overseas had also increased almost three times from 4.5 million in 1997 to 12 million in 2012 and 26 percent of them traveled to the ASEAN member countries.

Promotion of Intra-regional Tourism in East Asia

Although the main driving force behind tourism is people, government support is necessary for the expansion of tourism. In this context, I believe that our discussions should be focused on specific government measures or programs that would facilitate the flow of tourists. The following points could provide some food for thought in this regard.

First, the private sector should be further encouraged to do more in promoting intra-regional tourism in East Asia as was endorsed by our leaders in the ASEAN+3 Cooperation Work Plan for 2007-2017 which was adopted in 2007. To do this, governments of the member countries may consider providing extensive market-friendly incentives including, among others, deregulations.

Second, as easing visa-related restrictions has the effect of encouraging travel, a continued study should be made on a variety of initiatives for visa facilitation. Common Smart Visa System employed by some ASEAN member countries could serve as a useful reference in our future work. I would like to note that the EAVG II report published in November 2012 also recommended the promotion of intra-regional travel through visa facilitation.

Third, a tourism information service jointly designed by the ASEAN+3 member countries would further facilitate travel within the region as it allows citizens of the region to access tourism information more easily and efficiently. By working together, the ASEAN centers in China, Japan and Korea could play an important role in designing and implementing such a program.

On the other hand, in seeking to promote intra-regional tourism, we must be careful not to overlook its possible adverse effects such as the potential rise of transnational crime including human and drug trafficking, which may increase as cross-border travel becomes easier. Illegal residency, the spread of infectious diseases, and the depletion of natural resources may also occur due to increased intra-regional tourism. Therefore, it is critical that tourism promotion must be backed by joint efforts at the regional level to minimize these side effects.

Conclusion

Distinguished Delegates,

Over the last decade, ASEAN+3 countries have worked together to achieve their common goal of building an East Asian community. Much progress has been made thus far, but it is absolutely clear that more works need to be done. A key to fostering a greater sense of community is to enhance people-to-people connectivity, and tourism has an important role to play to this end. I sincerely hope that by the end of our discussions today, we will be able to come up with a clearer idea of what to do with tourism, with a view to enhancing people-to-people connectivity in East Asia.

Thank you very much.