In Southeast Asia, the share of the population living in extreme poverty has fallen dramatically. Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam are already estimated to have achieved the first Millennium Development Goal of halving the number of poor people, even though these countries still have many poor, particularly in rural areas. However, poverty is still widespread in Burma, East Timor, Cambodia and Laos.
Ethnic minorities live in many countries in the region. They often belong to the poor and vulnerable groups. Another aspect of poverty, which is common to large parts of Asia, is the lack of civil and political rights. The region consists of countries with widely varying political structures. There are military dictatorships, one-party states and constitutional democracies here, which respect democratic principles and human rights to a hugely varying degree.
There is also a major risk that the poor people’s situation could be made worse by the effects of climate change.
Sida’s regional cooperation in Asia
Sida works with regional contributions in Asia to solve problems common to many countries, or because there is a need to co-ordinate efforts in different countries. Another example where regional contributions are effective is when the actions of one country have a major influence on neighbouring states.
For example, building a dam in the upper part of the Mekong River has a major effect on poor people downstream who are dependent on the river for fishing and farming. The need for co-ordination between the countries along the Mekong River is therefore very important. Another example is when many countries border onto the same sea and there is a need for regional rules on fishing quotas.
Human trafficking is both a national and transnational problem. It often involves using poor and defenceless people who are not citizens of the country where they are. This is why regional co-operation to co-ordinate countries’ resources has proved to be very effective.
There are also some sensitive issues that are difficult to work with in some countries and where the conditions are better to work from a regional perspective. Rights for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people is one such example.
In Asia, Sida works through many players, such as: non-profit organizations that operate in many countries (the International Union for Conservation of Nature, Forum-Asia, and the Asia Pacific Forum of Human Rights Institutions); UN organizations and the Asian Development Bank; Swedish organizations (the Stockholm Environment Institute, the Raoul Wallenberg Institute) and regional academic institutions.
Sida also has its own environmental advisors on site in the region. The Swedish Environment Secretariat for Asia (SENSA) works from Bangkok to promote regional environmental cooperation between Swedish and regional players.
Geographic orientation
The target group for regional efforts in Asia is primarily poor people in the least developed countries in Southeast Asia. Sida also works with countries in Southern Asia to a lesser extent.
Sida’s support for regional efforts is provided within these four areas:
- The environment and sustainable use of natural resources
- Democracy and human rights
- Research cooperation
- HIV/Aids.
Examples of regional cooperation in Asia.
Regional democracy work
To support human rights work in Asia, Sida supports the Asia Pacific Forum of Human Rights Institutions (APF), which is a union of 15 countries’ commissions for human rights. Members include Indonesia, India and Nepal.
In each country, the human rights commissions examine whether the state is following the conventions that they have ratified. By co-operating regionally, the APF can provide training, work with capacity development and support future members. The APF is active in areas that include handicapped people’s issues, rights for internally displaced people, torture and trafficking.
Read more about Sida’s support to the APF.
HIV and Aids prevention through the ADB
Sida cooperates with the Asian Development Bank (ADB) in various ways to work for social and economic development in the region.
Sweden is supporting a fund that helps the ADB observe the HIV and Aids situation during major infrastructural projects that it is backing in the region. Building roads and other infrastructure often means that the workers live in temporary accommodation near construction sites for long periods of time, sometimes many years, far from their families and friends. Previous investigations have shown that this group has a very high risk of being infected with HIV. Information about sexually transmitted diseases is therefore extremely important because there is still a large degree of ignorance about this in these countries.
The support from Sweden means that the ADB is working to include preventative information regarding HIV/Aids right from the start when this type of large project begins. The ADB’s regional assignments are a necessity because the infrastructure often runs through several countries.
Read more about Sida’s support to the ADB.
