On Friday 19 October, Prime Minister Māris Kučinskis participated in the 12th Asia-Europe (ASEM) Summit in Brussels.
This year’s ASEM summit’s theme is “Global Partners for Global Challenges” where the aspects of connectivity between Asia and Europe and prospects for further cooperation between the two continents were discussed in order to ensure sustainable development, to limit climate change, to support multilateral trading system, disaster risk reduction and management, energy security, food safety and other global issues.
The strengthening of the connectivity between Europe and Asia is also important for Latvia in the fields of transport, digital connectivity and education. Latvia greatly appreciates the dialogue between Europe and Asia during the ASEM. When addressing the participants of the Summit, M. Kučinskis noted that in Latvia’s view the better connectivity is achievable through the transport infrastructure development and digital connectivity. With the help of the digital connectivity, by using the new technologies and against the global challenge, we need to build an inclusive society.
“Latvia’s geographical location in the centre of the Baltic Sea region, at the European Union’s external border with Russia and Belarus and sea links with Scandinavia together with well-developed transport infrastructure – three ice-free harbours, extensive rail network that even has routes to India and Pacific Ocean – allows us to offer new combined freight transport solutions with short transit times both from and to Asia,” said the Prime Minister.
India, Japan and the Middle East countries are in the centre of our attention. Latvia wants to attract cooperation partners from these countries as the potential investors both for the development of transport infrastructure in Latvia and attracting new routes for transit freights.
“With the aim to strengthen the connectivity between the two continents in the field of land transport, we all have to work both bilaterally and multilaterally within the framework of international organisations on the common standardisation, harmonisation, as well as on the reduction of barriers to border crossing in order to make these corridors more competitive and to respond to the increasing trade volumes between Asia and Europe,” said M. Kučinskis.
At a point where the data is becoming one of the main resources for the countries’ economics, the Latvian government has developed a Data Driven Nation Concept. One of the areas where the entrepreneurs work within the framework of this concept is the digital transport solutions. The digital transformation requires an active international cooperation with a particular focus on cross-sector projects. The Latvian infrastructure, openness and flexibility are a platform where to develop globally competitive solutions.
The cooperation between the ASEM countries in the field of education offers new opportunities for experience and information exchange and mobility. Nowadays the learning mobility is an integral part of the vocational and higher education. In Latvia there are students from more than 100 countries and the number of international students is growing annually reaching almost 11% of the student population.
The ASEM Summit is held every two years. Within the framework of the Summit, the Heads of State and Government discuss closer political, economic and cultural cooperation between European and Asian countries.
Andrejs Vaivars
Press Secretary to the Prime Minister
Phone: 29228678
E-mail: Andrejs.Vaivars@mk.gov.lv