At the APEC Voices of the Future (VOF) 2017 conference held this week in Vietnam, SMU’s Lee Kong Chian Distinguished Fellow Dr Noeleen Heyzer, who was also former Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations, emphasised three main challenges facing APEC economies – climate change, changing world economy with one of the main concerns being technological disruption, and inequality. A keynote speaker at VOF, she hoped to raise these issues for discussion as part of the topic “Promoting sustainable, innovative and inclusive growth amongst the youth in the Asia-Pacific region”.
“VOF is very important because it helps young Vietnamese people understand many things. For example, as we’re preparing for the APEC meetings, there’s this typhoon, so the issue of climate change is very important. If we don’t take focus on the climate change issue, we will experience worse weather patterns, our food supplies will be affected and our seas will be more acidic. Therefore, it is absolutely critical that these important issues are what the young generation actually takes on. And if we don’t help them address these issues now, they will be inheriting a world that is less secure,” said Dr. Heyzer.