JAKARTA, April 19 /TASS/. The World Economic Forum for East Asia will open in Indonesia on Sunday assembling more than 700 delegates from 40 countries.
The leaders of the world’s biggest companies will discuss the current regional problems against the background of global changes - decreasing U.S. influence; the increased roles of Russia and China as well as people’s growing mistrust of business and the state.
Russian Vice-Premier Arkady Dvorkovich will head the Russian delegation at the forum that will close on April 21, a source at the Russian embassy in Indonesia told TASS.
The delegation will also include Alexander Galushka, the minister for development of the Far East, as well as representatives of the Rusal and En+Group companies.
The main topics for discussion will include agriculture, the food market, trade and the spread of hi-tech. Several global issues will also be part of the agenda.
We are entering an era that will see an end to the US unilateral rule over the world. Countries like Russia and China are assuming more dominating roles, John Riadi, the forum’s co-chairman and director of Lippo Group, one of the biggest conglomerates in Indonesia, said. According to him, geopolitical changes bring new challenges, including economic ones that cannot go unnoticed.
Another global trend, according to the forum’s co-chairman, is the low level of popular trust in the state and business.
In many countries, people simply do not believe that their governments do everything that is necessary. People do not believe that the next 10 years will be better than the previous decade. People trust neither business nor the market, John Riadi said adding that lack of global trust was the root cause of economic instability and political unrest.
The delegates of the World Economic Forum will also discuss the forthcoming changes linked to the creation of the ASEAN Economic Community with an aim to form a common market of goods and labour for the 10 key regional states. The Economic Community is expected to begin operation late this year.
Roundtable meetings and negotiations behind the closed doors will take place on the forum’s sidelines on Sunday. Indonesian President Joko Widodo will address the plenary meeting on Monday.
The World Economic Forum for East Asia is being held in Jakarta for the second time since 2011. Apart from meetings devoted to East Asia, separate summits for Central and Eastern Europe, Middle East and Northern African will be organized at the World Economic Forum. These conferences will continue a series of annual meetings held in Davos, the world famous Alpine skiing resort, and will draw together the world’s most influential people - the heads of state and government, captains of world business, prominent scientists and economists, prominent sciences, economists and political scientists - for several days.