Our Chairman

Southeast Asia is at a critical juncture in its economic journey. The region has made significant progress in trade integration, investment flows, and economic cooperation. 

For decades, ASEAN’s commitment to neutrality and nonalignment has kept our region open, stable, and attractive to the world—even as great‑power competition rose and fell around us.

But Southeast Asia is entering a more consequential era. Neutrality on its own will no longer suffice. And while ASEAN’s greatest strength is its potential, potential is not a strategy.

To protect ASEAN’s long‑term interests and seize the opportunities in today’s geopolitical turbulence, we must shift from passive adaptation to deliberate, people‑centred action. This is the ‘how’ and ‘why’ of Southeast Asian Futures Initiative Centre (SEAFIC) inception.

Our mission is simple: drive forward‑looking, evidence‑based dialogue that helps the region anticipate change—not chase it. We will strive to bring together policymakers, industry leaders, academics, and innovators to map the pathways shaping Southeast Asia’s next decade: digital transformation, green growth, supply‑chain resilience, investment flows, and deeper regional integration.

The Southeast Asian Futures Initiative Centre (SEAFIC) provides grounded foresight—not to predict the future, but to prepare leaders for multiple futures. In a world reshaped by rivalry, technology, climate pressures, demographics, and shifting supply chains, the real risk is not change itself, but in being unprepared for it.

These forces are challenging long‑held assumptions about how ASEAN engages the world. The pressures are sharper, the stakes higher, and the pace of change faster than ever. 

Due to this, key gaps remain—between policy and impact, ambition and agency, and growth and resilience.

Having served as the ASEAN Economic Ministers Chair in 2025, I had the privilege of witnessing this progress firsthand, as well as addressing the practical challenges that continue to face our region. 

From trade facilitation and supply chain resilience to sustainability and digital transformation, Southeast Asian Futures Initiative Centre (SEAFIC) foresight studies will be a guide post to help policymakers and business leaders anticipate emerging trends, stress-test assumptions, and prepare for multiple future scenarios. It enables the region to move from reactive policymaking to strategic, long-term positioning.

By focusing not only on what is happening today, but also on what lies ahead, we are bridging short-term priorities with long-term planning to build a more robust region.

In an increasingly complex global environment, Southeast Asia requires institutions that are independent, credible, and regionally anchored. The Southeast Asian Futures Initiative Centre (SEAFIC) aspires to play this role, which we hope will contribute to a more resilient, competitive, and sustainable ASEAN.

Tengku Zafrul Aziz

Chairman

Southeast Asian Futures Initiative Centre (SEAFIC)