Intro: China firmly supports ASEAN's integration and community building as well as its centrality in regional cooperation. A wide range of cooperations between China and ASEAN countries have been implemented in recent years. This statement was issued in Phnom Penh, Cambodia on 11 November 2022.
We, the Member States of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the People’s
Republic of China, gathered at the 25th ASEAN-China Summit in Phnom Penh, Kingdom of Cambodia, on 11 November 2022.
RECOGNIZING that food security is a fundamental human right, an important foundation of national security, and a strategic guarantee for world peace and development;
RECALLING the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, China’s Global Development Initiative
and Cooperation Initiative on Global Food Security, the ASEAN Comprehensive Recovery Framework, the Joint Statement of the ASEAN-China Special Summit to Commemorate the 30th Anniversary of ASEAN-China Dialogue Relations;
NOTING that climate change, COVID-19, geopolitical conflicts, and supply chain disruptions have posed severe challenges to global governance of food security, and that food crisis is increasingly
expected to prolong and spread;
REAFFIRMING that ASEAN countries and China are active participants and important contributors to regional and global food security and are willing to further strengthen their policy communication, exchanges and cooperation;
UPHOLDING mutual respect, consensus-building and accommodating the comfort levels of all parties while taking proactive measures to enhance national and regional capacity of agricultural production and supply;
STRIVING TO ensure food security for the 2 billion-plus population in the region, stabilize regional food markets, and set an example for global food security governance;
CALLING UPON the international community to fundamentally strengthen food security; We have agreed to take the following practical measures in accordance with the four pillars of food security (namely food availability, access, utilization and stability):
I．ENSURE FOOD AVAILABILITY
1. Boosting food productivity. We will enhance policy exchanges and mutual learning, scientific and technological innovation as well as technology demonstration and application, to increase the productivity of rice, corn, soybean and other major crops and to ensure food availability by expanding the effective supply of diverse foods, including meats, aquatic products, fruits and vegetables.
2. Increasing capacity for emergency food reserves. We will support the ASEAN Plus Three Emergency Rice Reserve (APTERR) in playing a bigger role in regional food security, and strengthen the role of the ASEAN Food Security Information System (AFSIS) in data collection on regional commodity crops and disaster monitoring and early warning.
3. Improving the quality and safety of agricultural products. We will breed superior crop varieties and promote their wider use, advance standard procedures along the farm-to-table process, and build brands for well-known local premium agricultural products, to bolster the competitiveness of agricultural products within this region and meet people’s growing health and nutrition needs.
II. FACILITATE FOOD ACCESS
4. Boosting agro-trade and deepening investment cooperation in accordance with the rules of the WTO and the FTAs of which ASEAN and China are parties. We will promote agro-trade policy synergy based on the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), improve business environment within the region for closer cooperation across the value chain including food production, logistics, storage and processing, and develop cross-border agro-trade, to ensure stable and unblocked supply chains for agri-produce in the region and counter excessive food market fluctuations caused by supply chain disruptions.
5. Improving farmers’ ability to increase their income. We will boost farmers’ employment and income through rural industries with unique local features, extend agricultural value chains through processing, and link farmers to the market through digital agriculture.
III. PROMOTE EFFICIENT FOOD UTILISATION
6. Reducing food loss and waste. We will organize more outreach programmes for stronger public awareness of and consensus on food loss and waste reduction. We will promote technologies and
equipment to reduce food loss and waste throughout the food supply chain.
IV. ENSURE THE STABILITY OF FOOD SECURITY
7. Making agriculture more adaptive and resilient to climate change. We will align the Action Plan on China-ASEAN Green Agriculture with the ASEAN Guidelines on Sustainable Agriculture, develop climate-smart agriculture for lower carbon intensity and better adaptation to the impacts of climate change and extreme weather, and develop renewable energy in rural areas.
8. Alleviating poverty. We will foster and build up leading businesses and farmer cooperatives to reduce poverty through developing local industries. We will enhance technical training to improve skills of production, employment and entrepreneurship of farmers, especially small-holder farmers, women and young farmers, so as to motivate their inner drive to achieve the goal of poverty alleviation.
We encourage ASEAN countries and China to deepen the cooperation between central governments, local governments, regional organizations and the UN agencies such as the FAO, and mechanisms such as the ASEAN-China Agricultural Cooperation Forum, promote collaboration between the public sector, private sector, academia and civil society, and pool the strengths and commitments of stakeholders through such activities as policy dialogue, joint research, project implementation, capacity building, and personnel exchanges, in order to jointly safeguard regional food security
