This article first appeared in Forum, The Edge Malaysia Weekly on May 18, 2026 - May 24, 2026
The 48th Asean Summit, held from May 6 to 8 in Cebu, was much reduced in scale. It was the first with the Philippines in the chair this year. The big one, the 49th coming, will be held in November. It is not likely to be much grander given the energy crisis that will persist, caused by the American-Israeli attack on Iran from Feb 28, and the global disorder since US President Donald Trump came to power for a second time.
The chosen theme, “Navigating our future, together” is apposite. But in usual Asean bland fashion, there is no specific action to address the immediate crisis.
A minister involved in the summit said to me: “Every country is struggling on its own to manage the challenges it faces.”
This is borne out by the statement issued at the summit’s end, which is long on good intentions and short on action now. Energy and food security are clearly essential and identified, but there is no relief offered to the Philippines, for instance, which has declared an energy emergency and has already seen its first-quarter gross domestic product growth plummet to 2.8%, the worst since the post-pandemic slump.
Actually, all through the Covid-19 pandemic, Asean did not even manage to put together bulk-buying of vaccines as individual members scampered to save lives and livelihoods.
The Asean Business Advisory Council (Asean-BAC), in a paper titled “A Pathway to Recovery and Hope for Asean”, had proposed to Asean leaders that this be done and, further, suggested that an executive council be appointed by the leaders to make urgent decisions, as the leaders meet only twice a year.
The Indonesian position then was that the proposal was okay as long as it was understood the exco was ad hoc only for the purpose of confronting the pandemic. The 2020 Asean chair, Vietnam, did not push the proposal through. None of the other leaders did anything about it either. Each member state struggled on its own to keep people and economies alive.
It is not likely to be any different in the geopolitical crisis this time as Asean navigates its future not quite together. Hopefully, there will be no shipwrecks in the current storm.
In the Asian financial crisis of 1997/98, most Asean economies were devastated. There were riots and a messy regime change in Indonesia. It took a long time for recovery in the region but the economies were in time restored. If not alive and kicking just now, some may feel we will get over the current crisis as well.
People at the top always feel the least pain but they must be mindful of social and political turmoil that could hurt their interests, and cause regional and domestic disorder to add to what the world is already going through.
Some Asean states, like Singapore, have the resources to ride it out. Myanmar is in a dreadful mess, as we all know, with spillover into Thailand.
Food inflation is creeping up, 6.1% in the Philippines and 5.7% in Cambodia, for instance. Food unaffordability in Laos is 56%, 44% in the Philippines, 43% in Indonesia and 38% in Myanmar. The Asian Development Bank (ADB) estimates that on the present course, 6.8 million people — 1% of Asean’s population — will be thrown into abject poverty by 2027.
It is often celebrated that with close to 700 million people, Asean is the third largest market in the world. It should be given equal emphasis that close to seven million of that population are going to be poverty-stricken. If there is no concern over this situation, Asean will become even more distant from the common man.
It cannot be denied that Asean is good for long-term plans, some of which are achieved, even if imperfectly. The Asean Free Trade Area formed the basis of economic integration with tariffs now down to 0%, but non-tariff barriers have still to be surmounted. The Asean Economic Community was “established” in 2015, but it is an aspirational journey. The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) was conceived by Asean in 2012, but it only came into being in 2022. The Digital Economy Framework Agreement is still outstanding after having been said to be close to the finishing line for a couple of years now.
Asean economic and foreign ministers met together for the first time last year, at least eight years after the Asean-BAC had been calling for it, because of overlaps and gaps. It is good that it has now, at last, become a regular feature.
Last year, when Malaysia was chair, Asean was more committed to act more swiftly to meet contemporary and immediate challenges. The intervention in the border conflict between Cambodia and Thailand last July was quick. The forging of new economic relationships with other regions, even getting Trump over for whatever little good it did, were encouraging demonstrations of response and action as necessary in the sweep of global events.
Now it gets difficult. The sharing of resources is involved. Singapore or Malaysia are not likely to share theirs, as Germany did not with Greece, which was on its knees after the Western financial crisis of 2008. Indeed they have buckled down to look after their own economic, social and political stability.
The energy crisis caused by the attack on Iran will go right into 2027, even if there was an end to the war today. Supplies are clogged up. It would take a few months before the oil and gas reach their destinations. The price, always sticky on the way down, will not be normalised. Infrastructure and production facilities have been destroyed. So many petrochemical byproducts have been done in. There has been a shortage of urea in the agricultural production cycle.
Even with the war’s end, it could happen all over again. This is the new normal in the world today, caused largely by a totally irresponsible US and an Israel that uses force without respite: if force does not work, use more force.
In Cebu, Asean leaders did not even pretend that they were on the same page in assessing the global disorder. However, where they could commit to help members in distress, they did not really try. On energy, there is of course the Asean Petroleum Security Agreement, but it is voluntary and commercially-based. Perhaps some might get through if reserves run dry, say in the Philippines, at market price even?
Meanwhile, ERIA, a Japanese research institution based in Jakarta, Indonesia, is working on an Asean energy Joint Stockpiling System, a multi-year programme that will only be completed when Thailand takes the Asean chair in 2028. Not much use this year or next, but at least something that should be adopted when ready. There will be a next time.
Indeed, there is something else Asean should be doing of actual need and relevance. The Secretariat has a unit monitoring supply chains. It should go beyond monitoring to anticipating through forecasts based on gaming. It could be of help, particularly to small and medium enterprises that are at sea in an unpredictable era.
It could develop into a kind of service centre, although those using its analysis will have to be responsible for their own decisions. This way, Asean can become more relevant and useful, not remote with big meetings, however not so grand as before, which come out with words not decipherable, or meaningful, to the common man.
When Asean prospered, it was based on a stable world order, open and free markets and peace, particularly the China-US relationship was not undermined by a trade war and potential conflict. That world is no more.
Asean and much of the global South have been calling for a new world economic order for decades. Now it is forced on them. Asean must work to construct it not just by talking of building relationships in general, but by initiating actual trade and investment linkages. One between RCEP and the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership would be a good strategic start. It must be part of the Asean agenda NOW — to be achieved in much less than the 10 years it took for RCEP to come into being.
Tan Sri Dr Munir Majid is chairman of CARI Asean Research and Advocacy and president of the Asean Business Club
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