I'm very grateful to be part of the ASEAN Indo-Pacific Forum today. This is an important year for Canada because we're officially launching the Canada ASEAN Strategic Partnership. ASEAN is one of the world's fastest growing economic regions, and Canada's fourth largest merchandise trading partner. Last year, Canadian exports and imports to and from ASEAN increased by 29% from the year prior.

So we are determined to have closer and stronger ties with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.

Strengthening our ties with ASEAN is a big part of our Indo-Pacific strategy because we recognize and support ASEAN centrality in the region. We will be increasing our engagement in the long term with an even more active presence. We're already working together in sectors like aerospace, defence clean technology and education. And today the focus of this discussion is Green Infrastructure and resilient supply chains.

So, some of you may know Canada is in the midst of our worst wildfire season ever. And this kind of terrible happening isn't limited to Canada. It's going on all around the world, including here in the Indo-Pacific. Which is one of the regions most exposed to extreme weather events exacerbated by climate change. In 2023 alone, we've seen heavy rains and flooding here in Indonesia, but also in India, in the Republic of Korea, China and Japan. Tropical storms have hit the Philippines and Taiwan. A cyclone devastated Myanmar. Heat waves have swept over Asia.

In April, Laos and Thailand recorded their hottest temperatures ever. The disasters we're facing as a world are not just bad luck. They're being driven by climate change and nature loss. Climate change is a global challenge that requires global solutions.

We must be responsible for each other. These past few years, whether it's been through natural disasters, a pandemic, a global economic crisis, or through the consequences of conflicts, we have seen time and time again just how interconnected everyone in the world is.

And so, it's increasingly clear that climate policy is economic policy is security policy.

Communities everywhere must benefit from investments that will guarantee their economic and environmental future.

Communities everywhere, including here in ASEAN countries, need to see investments that will secure their future, both their economic well-being and the well-being of the environment and nature that supports them.

The Asian Development Bank speaks about the need to attain a triple win building infrastructure that reduces emissions and climate risk, while stimulating economic development and increasing returns for investors at the same time.

This is certainly something that FinDev Canada is focused on, including in sectors like renewable energy, sustainable transportation and water projects. FinDev Canada is our bilateral development finance institution. It supports sustainable growth through the private sector by providing financing, investment and blended finance solutions as well as technical assistance. Last year, during the launch of Canada's Indo-Pacific Strategy, we announced a further $750 million in global capitalization for FinDev. In May, FinDev Canada signed an agreement with the Asian Development Bank to enhance cooperation on sustainable private sector investments across the region. And this week, we're announcing that FinDev will be opening a new office here in the Indo-Pacific. These initiatives will support high quality, high standard, sustainable infrastructure. Canada will continue to leverage the expertise of our private sector and invest in growth that benefits all sides, including through technical capacity building. FinDev Canada's efforts in the region will create growth and improve the well-being of people. And it's just one tool in our toolbox to support good projects.

We're also investing in infrastructure through other means. For example, here in Indonesia, we're supporting the Karian Serpong Water Supply Project that will help provide reliable and safe, clean drinking water to over 2 million people. In the provinces of East Nusa Tenggara and Maluku. We're supporting a project that will connect an additional 2 million people to the electrical grid while scaling up solar power investments and lowering the cost of power generation by 20%. Canada's financing helped make this project feasible and contributions from all parties helped catalyze $400 million US from the private sector.

These initiatives will help mitigate the effects of climate change while creating economic growth at the same time. In other words, we're keeping people safe while creating jobs and prosperity.

Building a sustainable and prosperous future together is one of the objectives of Canada's Indo-Pacific strategy.

Our Indo-Pacific strategy is centered on creating jobs and opportunities for everyone. Canadian companies and investors, as well as our scientists and researchers, are well-positioned to work with ASEAN partners to foster innovative solutions. We will continue to contribute to the region's growing infrastructure needs and deploy our environmental expertise in areas such as ocean management, disaster risks and resilient biodiversity and clean energy.

Canada has what it takes to help ASEAN attain its goals. I just mentioned clean energy. Canada is becoming the reliable supplier of clean energy a net zero world needs. More than ever, in these challenging times, we need resilient supply chains, stable trading relationships and alignment on values. This is about securing the resources that our economies and citizens rely on, whether that's, energy, or raw materials or food. Canada is a reliable partner. It's not a coincidence that we have 15 free trade agreements that cover 61% of the world's GDP and open markets to one and a half billion consumers worldwide. And we're negotiating more trade deals, including with ASEAN and right here with our Indonesian hosts. Canada has ambitious, educated workers, our immigration policies are attracting highly skilled talent and we have incredible natural resources. Canada is one of the world's largest food exporters and can contribute to ASEAN food security.

And we're among the world's largest exporters of fertilizer. We're also a responsible supplier of critical minerals that make everything from solar panels to battery packs. A responsible supplier means that we have high safety standards and environmental protections because that's the way the world is going. We need to remember to put people at the centre of everything we do, including by investing, to make sure our workers will have great jobs not just now, but for generations to come. Whether it's to produce electric vehicles or clean steel. When people are doing well, when we make sure the middle class is thriving, we foster security and stability and stability is a key element of supply chain resilience. It benefits everyone. That's one of the things we have to focus on so much right now, understanding that insecurity and instability around the world is one of the greatest challenges, not just to economies, but to democracies. When people don't feel secure, secure in their own jobs, secure within their community. Feel secure for their kids or for their path to retirement, they become more vulnerable more or vulnerable to populist thinking, to authoritarianism, to being swayed by the misinformation and disinformation that surrounds them every day on social media. People are anxious. No wonder people are anxious. The world is changing now, harder and faster than it ever has. Pandemic. Climate change. Global conflicts. Reorienting geo-stability. Uncertain economics. The rise of AI and automation, putting jobs at risk. No wonder people are worried.

No wonder people are anxious. No wonder people are looking for any solutions they can. And what we need as leaders, whether it's political leaders or business leaders, is to show people that there is room for them in the future we're all building together. People see the future as change. They see change is coming to the world. They just aren't sure that there's room for them in that future. And that goes at the very core of the idea of promise that the idea of progress and that promise that is central to our economies, to our institutions, to our national well-beings. The idea that the hard work of one generation makes things better and easier for the next generation. Our parents all worked hard for us to be able to end up in a room like this at a time like this. All of us are working really hard, but parents everywhere are unsure that tomorrow's opportunities are really going to be greater for their kids because so much else is changing.

And that's why offering reliability stability, a sense that even as everything is changing, we've got this our institutions are seeing how the world is going. Seeing where the weaknesses are, and pulling together to say, no, you can't just choose what's good for the environment or what's good for the economy. They have to go together. And you can't just know that trade deals create growth. That growth that's created needs to be shared equitably across citizens, across communities, because if not people pull their support away from pro-growth policies.

What we have to do, business and government together, is make sure we are showing our workers, our, citizens, our neighbours, our kids that there is a path forward into a brighter future that features them at the centre of it. Remembering the impact on people of everything we do is central not just to our short-term success, but to our long-term success. As friends and neighbours. I say neighbours, of course, because Indonesia and Canada are neighbours. Canada is a Pacific nation. The Indo-Pacific is our neighbourhood. And by engaging and investing in this partnership, we're looking out at the horizon of the Indo-Pacific future with a clear view of the shared prosperity that lies ahead for Canadians and for people throughout this region.

I often say that the promise of Canada is an improved standard of living for each successive generation.

As I just said, the promise of Canada, the promise of progress is always one that we can make things better for the next generation than it was for the last. But that promise is not unique to Canada. It should be a promise we make to everyone everywhere. So, as we look towards the future, as we look to invest in the future, let us make sure we’re remembering that progress. That promise of progress. That things are supposed to get better. One year to the next, one generation to the next, and none of us can sit back and hope it will just happen on its own. Or the right government will make it happen on its own. Or the right business will show up and make it happen on its own. that it only happens when we understand the role that every single one of us, civil society, business, public sector, political leadership, all have in working together to create that better future we all need.

Thank you very much, dear friends.

Thank you very much.