Date Published:
April 13, 2021
The Consulate General of Japan in Davao launched the first BIMP-EAGA–Japan Investment Seminar online on 24 March in partnership with the Mindanao Development Authority (MinDA).
Yoshiaki Miwa, Consul General of the Consulate General of Japan in Davao, said the investment seminar was initiated for the benefit of both Japanese and Filipino companies and government and non-government sectors. He said the objective of the seminar series is to help “restart the economy that was adversely affected by COVID-19 [coronavirus disease pandemic] and spur development” in the BIMP-EAGA subregion.
The subregion covers the entire sultanate of Brunei Darussalam; the provinces of Kalimantan, Sulawesi, Maluku and West Papua of Indonesia; the states of Sabah and Sarawak and the federal territory of Labuan in Malaysia; and the island of Mindanao and the province of Palawan in the Philippines.
The event was hosted on the Zoom platform and livestreamed via MinDA’s Facebook page.
“Through the series of BIMP-EAGA-Japan investment seminars, we would like to promote the relationship between BIMP-EAGA and Japan. We believe that the potential of boosting growth in trade investment and tourism within the BIMP-EAGA area is high since their economies complement each other,” Miwa said. He said there is high potential in “enhancing connectivity not only in the context of sea and air transport or logistics but also in terms of technology and people to people exchange.”
The webinar featured presentations from MinDA chairman Emmanuel F. Piñol, MinDA Deputy Executive Director Romeo M. Montenegro, Principal Operations Communications Specialist Jason Rush at the Asian Development Bank, and Associate Professor Yusuke Takagi at the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies in Tokyo.