Strengthening Victoria’s Connections with Southeast Asia: The art/s of exchange

The Indo-Pacific trade and investment landscape has changed significantly in the past two years. New developments and emerging policy trends are reshaping the post-COVID trade environment, driven by pandemic responses and influenced by geopolitical tensions. Digital transformation of trade, supply chain disruption, labour mobility challenges and emerging climate and energy policy approaches are key developments that are of particular importance for Victoria’s trade relationship with Southeast Asian countries in the new landscape. The changing nature of trade is driving growth in new services industries and accelerating digitisation of supply chains across economies in the Southeast Asian region. Digitally enabled services are becoming more important to support trade. However, significant regulatory barriers remain. Extreme disruptions to supply chains, combined with geopolitical tensions of the past few years, have resulted in fundamental changes to how and where trade is conducted. They have highlighted the importance of resilient, open and diversified trade and investment links and the role of effective strategies to manage geopolitical risks. The COVID pandemic has exacerbated labour shortages, highlighted skills imbalances across the region and illuminated the dependence of trade on labour flows. It has also revealed the challenges of maintaining and creating open frameworks for movement of workers and professionals between markets, including amongst ASEAN economies. Driven by policy developments and technological advances, Victoria and its partners in the region are investing significantly in the industries of the future, including renewable energy and other environmental goods. ASEAN is a rapidly growing market for renewable energy, driving greater two-way trade and investment collaboration.