1. The 2^nd ROK-BIMP-EAGA Senior Officials’ Meeting was held on June 17 with Ms. Eui-hae Cecilia Chung, Director-General for ASEAN and Southeast Asian Affairs of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the ROK, and Datuk Dr. Zunika Binti Mohamed, Deputy Director-General of the Economic Planning Unit of the Prime Minister’s Department of Malaysia, as co-chairs.

※ The Brunei Darussalam-Indonesia-Malaysia-Philippines East ASEAN Growth Area (BIMP-EAGA) is an economic cooperation initiative launched in 1994 to spur development in remote and less developed areas of the four Southeast Asian countries.

※ The Senior Special Duties Officer of the Ministry of Finance and Economy of Brunei Darussalam, the Deputy Minister of the Coordinating Ministry for Economic Affairs of Indonesia, and the Undersecretary of the Mindanao Development Authority of the Philippines also attended the meeting representing their countries.

2. Director-General Chung reaffirmed the ROK government’s commitment to enhancing its relations with ASEAN and introduced the government’s plans to seek greater solidarity with ASEAN, including BIMP-EAGA, through substantive and reciprocal cooperation.

ㅇ In addition, Director-General Chung appreciated the steady progress made in BIMP-EAGA-ROK cooperation after its launch in 2021 and explained the ROK government’s efforts to lay a strong foundation for its cooperation with BIMP-EAGA through means such as increasing its contribution to the BIMP-EAGA-ROK Cooperation Fund (BKCF) from 1 million USD in 2021 to 3 million in 2022.

※ The BIMP-EAGA-ROK Cooperation Fund was established in 2021 to strengthen cooperation between the ROK and Maritime Southeast Asia, the plans for which were announced by the ROK government at the 21^st ASEAN-ROK Summit in November 2020.

※ The ROK government has established, and is operating, three cooperation funds as a financing tool for strengthening substantive cooperation with ASEAN: ASEAN-ROK Cooperation Fund, Mekong-ROK Cooperation Fund, ROK-BIMP-EAGA Cooperation Fund.

3. The senior officials of BIMP-EAGA countries emphasized that ROK-BIMP-EAGA cooperation would contribute to promoting inclusive and balanced growth in the Southeast Asian region and expressed gratitude for the ROK government’s leading efforts to strengthen cooperation.

4. The senior officials also approved the first batch of ROK-BIMP-EAGA cooperation projects for implementation in the areas of climate change and renewable energy, which are in high demand in BIMP-EAGA countries.

※ The approved projects are titled “Developing Land Management Options for Diverse Cacao-based System in Mindanao” and “Renewable Energy Certificate Potential in the Areas of BIMP.”

ㅇ In addition, the senior officials designated the environment, connectivity, and tourism as priority cooperation areas for 2022 and agreed to identify and promote diverse projects that can deliver concrete results utilizing the BKCF.

5. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs will continue to work on expanding the horizon of the ROK’s cooperation with ASEAN by deepening the ROK-BIMP-EAGA cooperation, along with its cooperation with Mekong countries.