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12 Jun, 2014

ASEAN Urged To Reap Benefit Of Demographic Dividend

KUALA LUMPUR, June 12 (NNN-Bernama) — Asean has great potential to reap the benefit of demographic dividend as half of its population comprised young people, said economist Dr Munir Majid.

Munir said fifty per cent of the world’s population of over seven billion was young people under the age of 30, and of that, 90 per cent of the group was from emerging and developing economies.

“Thus demographic dividend in terms of extra growth can be enjoyed from the increase in the share of working young people.

“Asean has a special factor. The growth rate of Asean countries, where over half of our population are under 30, could be further enhanced by the share of our working young people,” Munir said after facilitating a formation meeting of the Asean Young Entrepreneurs Association (AYEA) here.

Representatives from nine Asean countries, except the Philippines, attended the meeting.

AYEA is using the Asean Business Advisory Council’s (Asean-BAC) platform, in which Munir is the chairman of Asean-BAC Malaysia chapter, to begin the process of establishing the formation.

Munir said Asean-BAC was incubating the formation of AYEA, starting from a group to a council, and to finally as an association upon endorsement from the leaders of the Asean countries in the coming Asean summit in November.

“Demographic dividend in terms of extra growth can be enjoyed from the increase in the share of working young people as productive resources, but on the other hand, having many young people could be a double-edged sword if they could not find job.

“However, if we channel them into several certain productive directions, that is going to give a special “cake” — a special additional growth – in economy which has many young people,” he said.