Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and his Malaysian counterpart Anwar Ibrahim on January 30 witnessed the signing of three bilateral cooperation agreements on the digital economy, green economy, personal data protection, and cyber security.

Anwar has been in Singapore for his first official visit to the country since he took office as Malaysia's 10th prime minister on November 24, 2022.

Malaysia’s Ministry of International Trade and Industry and Singapore’s Ministry of Trade and Industry signed two agreements on the digital economy and green economy.

The green economy framework agreement is Malaysia’s first green economy agreement signed with any country.

The agreement is expected to tighten the two countries’ cooperation in decarbonisation and support enterprises and workers in taking advantage of opportunities that the green economy can bring. 

The two countries will work together on the setting of standards and the deployment of charging points for electric vehicles.

They will exchange information on low-carbon solutions, including on technical and regulatory issues, and explore joint studies and demonstration projects, particularly in hydrogen and carbon capture, utilisation, and storage.

Within the framework of digital economic cooperation, the two countries will strengthen cooperation within the framework of the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) and the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) as well as under the terms of the two agreements.

The agreement is also expected to promote the expansion of digital economic cooperation in ASEAN in areas including trade facilitation, cross-border data flows, electronic payments, digital identity, and supports for the digitisation of industries and small businesses to enhance their competitiveness.

Meanwhile, Singapore’s Ministry of Communications and Information (MCI) and Malaysia’s Ministry of Communications and Digital signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) that will enable them to cooperate on issues such as personal data protection as well as cybersecurity.

The MOU is expected to help authorities of the two countries to exchange information, expertise, and solutions in data protection policies, cross-border data flows as well as address common cybersecurity threats and emerging technologies like artificial intelligence and distributed ledger technology.

Indonesia's 2023 state budget focused on employment, poverty alleviation

Indonesian President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) has appealed to all ministerial ranks to channel the 2023 state budget into productive activities, especially pertaining to job creation.

The head of state noted during a plenary cabinet meeting on January 16 that the 2023 state budget must be focused on productive activities, especially in the context of job creation and poverty alleviation.

The president remarked apart from productive programmes, the 2023 state budget is also focused on completing national priority programmes, such as reducing stunting rates, lowering extreme poverty, and the agenda ahead of the 2024 election with focuses on national priority programmes such as the people’s economy, exports and investment.

He also said that the use of the regional budget must be in line with the state budget that focuses on national priority programs, such as the people's economy, exports, and investment.

According to him, the government managed to achieve positive results amid external pressure in the turbulent year of 2022, such as economic growth that was projected to lie in the range of around 5.2% to 5.3%, to inflation that can still be controlled at the level of 5.5%.

He viewed that 2023 will not be an easy year since several major countries, such as the European Union, China, and the US, are experiencing economic downturns due to increasing geopolitical pressure.