ASEAN Strategic Policy Dialogue on Disaster Management 2025 – Speech by Mr Edwin Tong, Minister for Law and Second Minister for Home Affairs

Your Excellency Dr Kao Kim Hourn, Secretary-General of ASEAN,

Your Excellency Mr Sujiro Seam, Ambassador of the EU to ASEAN,

Heads of the National Disaster Management Organisations of the ASEAN Member States,

And our many distinguished guests,

Introduction

1. Good morning, and I would like to start with a very a warm welcome to all our distinguished guests from overseas.

2. I warmly welcome you to Singapore, and I hope that besides being able to partake in discussions, exchange of know-how over the next two days, you will also get to see a little bit of Singapore.

3. I am very happy to be with you today, this morning, for the opening of the ASEAN Strategic Policy Dialogue on Disaster Management 2025, or SPDDM.

4. I would like to start first by thanking Cambodia, the Chair of the ASEAN Ministerial Meeting on Disaster Management, and of the ASEAN Committee on Disaster Management, for your leadership on these issues over the past year.

Milestones in ASEAN’s Journey in Disaster Management

5. This year marks several key milestones.

6. First, this is the 10th iteration of SPDDM.

7. Over the last decade, we have made significant progress.

8. SPDDM has provided a platform for academics, for practitioners as well as for organisations from various ASEAN member states and dialogue partners to come together to have a place, a platform and a forum to discuss disaster management policies, as well as think about strategies for the region.

9. Second, it has been 20 years since they established the ASEAN Agreement on Disaster Management and Emergency Response, or AADMER.

10. This was in the aftermath of the Indian Ocean tsunami.

11. Natural disasters are a perennial risk for all of us at ASEAN, and their scale, impact and frequency have been recently exacerbated by climate change.

12. Just last month, Tropical Cyclone Wipha made landfall over Laos and the Philippines, damaging infrastructure and agricultural land.

13. Many communities, families, individuals had their lives uprooted, and their economic livelihoods destroyed.

14. But because of AADMER, ASEAN has strengthened its disaster response capability, and this has allowed us to mitigate this disaster to some extent, the devastation inflicted by natural disasters such as Tropical Cyclone Wipha.

(a) For example, regional emergency stockpiles amassed under the Disaster Emergency Logistics System for ASEAN were quickly dispatched from a satellite warehouse in Quezon City.

(b) This to help affected communities in remote areas in the Philippines, and this included personal hygiene kits as well as shelter toolkits.

15. Indeed, ASEAN, I believe, has made tremendous progress in disaster management over the last 20 years.

16. This morning, I would like to highlight three areas I believe will be vital for ASEAN to focus on for the next decade, to carry our contingency planning to the next level.

17. And these three areas are in the space of localisation, knowledge exchange as well as innovation.

Localisation of Capacity Building

18. First, let me touch on localisation.

19. ASEAN has steadily expanded its capabilities to manage disasters.

(a) We have established the Emergency Response and Assessment Team, or ASEAN-ERAT, which is equipped with specialised skills to conduct a very high-level of sophisticated needs assessment and facilitate humanitarian assistance, and this allows it to support countries affected by disasters.

(b) The number of members has increased from 322 in 2021 to 457 in 2025. This is not just encouraging, but is also a testament to the consistency and value of our training and capacity building.

(c) Most recently, three ASEAN-ERAT members were deployed to Laos to conduct a needs and recovery assessment for the areas affected by Tropical Cyclone Wipha.

20. We recognise, however, that a one-size-fits-all approach cannot meet the needs of a region as diverse as ASEAN.

21. We all have different spaces geographically, across quite different terrains, and different issues affect different parts of ASEAN.

22. Thus, we have made strides to customise the ASEAN-ERAT programme to each country’s needs and context.

(a) The tailored training curriculum takes into consideration the logistics capability of each country as well as the uses of local languages. We need to contextualise the way in which we design our planning to fit the local considerations, some of the constraints, some of the resources that they have, and to be able to do in in the language that is immediately recognisable in the local setting.

(b) This then ensures that local responders can react to an emergency, not just quickly, but in a way which is most effective, by being able to harness local resources and communicate in local language.

23. In addition, local communities are also being empowered to identify, evaluate and mitigate disaster risks.

24. They implement solutions based on their own living environment, their own terrain and their way of life, which would of course differ from region to region.

25. Let me share two examples to illustrate this point.

(a) In Indonesia, under the “Disaster Resilient Villages” initiative, local community representatives from various hamlets within Panusupan Village came together to map out disaster evacuation routes and identify locations to establish landslide warning sirens. They also identified locations at which to plant over 100 mango trees, and this helps to mitigate the risk of landslides.

(b) Another local initiative: the Vietnam Association of the Elderly in Phu Thuong Ward drew up very detailed plans to support immobile people during storms and floods. And this included details such as deploying wheelchairs for the elderly and people with disabilities at certain locations to ensure their prompt evacuation to safety during Typhoon Noru in 2022.

26. These are but two examples, and I am sure there are many other examples of how local collaborations contextualise the local setting.

Knowledge Exchange and Collaboration

27. Second, let me speak about knowledge exchange.

28. The preceding examples I mentioned demonstrate that insight and expertise are clearly not just found exclusively within governments.

29. It’s not just within organisations either. It is very much part of the ground-up activities and ground-up collaborations.

30. Academic specialists and community advocates can also make valuable contributions in discourse on disaster management.

31. It is therefore, I believe, useful for us to foster the exchange of knowledge and best practices across all sectors of society, particularly within disaster-prone areas.

32. The SPDDM is one such platform.

33. And I am pleased, this morning, to announce that another platform, the inaugural Singapore-International Disaster and Emergency Management Expo, or SIDEX, will be taking place in November this year.

34. I would like to warmly welcome all of you to SIDEX, which will be the largest showcase on disaster management and emergency response in the Asia-Pacific, where the conference will cover topics ranging from societal resilience and psychological resilience of the community – which is sometimes underrated.

35. We also want to ensure community preparedness – to think about not just whether, but when it will happen.

36. We look forward to having all of you at SIDEX later this year.

37. At the same time, ASEAN, I believe, must also continue to leverage the experiences of other countries, such as our Plus Partners from China to Japan ,and the Republic of Korea.

38. These collaborations and networks only serve to expand our knowledge and our base of experience.

39. And I think we all start with the perspective that there is no monopoly over good ideas – the more we exchange, the more we talk about scenarios, the more we are able to exchange best practices and know-how, the stronger we will be, and we would be able to level up.

(a) The Republic of Korea, as an example, has trained around 320 individuals under the “Disaster Risk Management Capacity Building Project for ASEAN Member States” since the year 2020.

(b) They have facilitated field visits to their incident command centres, provided virtual simulation-based training for various disaster scenarios.

Innovation

40. A third area to which ASEAN could give focus in order to improve our disaster management capabilities, is to really embrace innovation.

41. And I think that really goes without saying – innovation is a major disrupter, but also a major partner in almost every field of work.

42. And I would say that in this space, innovation in disaster management, our youth leaders can provide a very fresh, and somewhat valuable and different perspective.

43. It is my pleasure to welcome Mr Joshua Belayan as the first youth speaker to grace the SPDDM.

(a) Mr Belayan has an impressive track record in addressing environmental challenges.

(b) He led and presented the Bandar Seri Begawan Declaration on ASEAN Youth for Climate Action in 2021, which highlighted and brought to the front of the mind concerns and recommendations of ASEAN youth in strengthening regional climate action, movements by the young, and seeing things from their perspective.

44. After all, if there is one group in our society that is most concerned about what happens down the road in 30, 40, 50 years’ time, is today’s youth, and we should listen to it.

45. Youth advocates can also creatively engage and garner support from the communities that they themselves represent.

46. For example, students from the University of the Philippines Resilience Institute YouthMappers developed interactive educational modules and games for children, to inculcate knowledge on early warning and evacuation procedures, with the thinking that gamification is perhaps the best way of socialising concepts and ideas and raising awareness with the younger population.

(a) Following the success of the project’s initial run, these youth ambassadors intend to scale up the use of the games to spread these essential tips widely within their community.

47. On the technology front, I think we all agree that it is fast-moving, it is advancing.

48. What was cutting-edge today might not be tomorrow, and so we have to keep moving just to stay ahead.

49. We must capitalise on advancements such as AI, to enhance our disaster management efforts.

50. For example, to improve the accuracy and speed of our early warning systems at detecting and predicting hazards.

51. Communications technology is also very important.

52. How do we get our messaging out, especially to the more rural areas, to the mass population?

53. In emergencies, prompt and timely communication with the public is critical.

(a) The Philippines has deployed an AI-powered weather forecasting system that can more accurately predict weather patterns, at the individual neighbourhood level. The advance alert will provide residents more time to prepare for occasions, such as flooding.

(b) In Singapore, the Singapore Civil Defence Force, or SCDF, is working with local telecommunications companies to progressively implement the Cell Broadcast System, or CBS, by early 2026.

(i) The CBS will enable authorities to quickly alert the public in the affected area of an incident and broadcast emergency messages direct to their mobile phone.

(ii) The messages will provide the public with clear guidance on the protective measures which we can take.

54. At the same time, technological innovations also have the potential to support the act relief operations themselves.

(a) Singapore, for instance, deployed cyborg cockroaches during the earthquake in Myanmar earlier this year.

(b) These cyborg cockroaches helped in search-and-rescue efforts in very hard-to-reach places, inaccessible, or maybe dangerous places, under the rubble. There are many examples, and I would not be able to do justice for all the responders.

55. But the point I’m making is that with innovation, we can trial, we can experiment, we can think of what else we can do to level up. But the use of technology, the effect of AI to power of our predictability and innovations, are two key areas in disaster management.

Conclusion

56. In this quickly evolving landscape – not just in technology, but really the disaster landscape, with the overlay of climate change – this will remain very unpredictable, and in fact, if anything, will become even more volatile.

57. Nevertheless, I am confident that by embracing the same collaborative spirit, the generosity of sharing knowledge and wisdom and best practices and foresight, just as we did 20 years ago with the signing of AADMER, I think we can remain resilient as a region.

58. We can have strength in numbers and collectively we work together and I think we will be stronger as the sum of our parts.

59. I wish therefore to express my deepest appreciation to the European Union for their steadfast support.

60. To the co-organisers: SCDF, the ASEAN Secretariat and the ASEAN Coordinating Centre for Humanitarian Assistance on disaster management, for the organisation of the SPDDM.

61. A lot of thoughts have been given to the content of the speakers and developing knowledge and know-how.

62. But equally, I believe that it is a lot of participation in addition as well, so I look forward to that the next two days.

63. I also thank our many partners and participants for your continued engagement and support.

64. This has enabled SPDDM to foster meaningful discussions this past decade.

65. I trust the discussions today and tomorrow will likewise spark new ideas, provide valuable insights and also catalyse collaborations across different organisations and across different countries, to help us prepare even better for the next disaster.

66. I wish everyone a very fruitful dialogue for the next two days.

67. Thank you very much.