The 25th meeting of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) High Level Task Force on Economic Integration(HLTF-EI) was held in Yangon, Myanmar on 18th February 2014. ERIA, headed by Mr. Yasushi Iwata (General Manager), Dr. Ponciano Intal Jr. (Senior Researcher), and Mr. Yoshifumi Fukunaga (Senior Policy Coordinator) attended the said meeting.

Dr. Ponciano Intal presented the results of the ERIA study ASEAN RISING: Moving ASEAN and AEC Forward beyond 2015. He also presented the ERIA proposed study AEC Scorecard Phase 4.

The HLTF-EI officials warmly received the results of the ASEAN RISING study. They stated that they will use the results of the study in the formulation of the vision for ASEAN post 2015. They also recognized that the AEC Scorecard Phase 4 can be a valuable output to understand status and bottlenecks to the implementation of AEC measures. Per request of HLTF-EI, ERIA will accelerate the implementation of the AEC Scorecard Phase 4 project for completion this year to help inform the Economic Ministers and ASEAN Leaders accordingly.

The HLTF-EI is the highest ranking sub-ministerial ASEAN body since it is composed mainly of deputy ministers and permanent-secretaries of ASEAN Member States.