In a globalised world, connectivity between countries is fundamental to trade, transport, international relations and the mobility of people, among many other things. However, in deepening international connections, sustainable development (in social, environmental and economic forms) should not be overlooked.

Sustainable connectivity aims to build connections between countries that also help to achieve sustainable development goals. The JRC’s work on sustainable connectivity helps to understand how connectivity and sustainable development are related and feeds into international dialogue and policy making, including the Asia-Europe Meeting and the EU’s Connectivity Strategy.

ASEM Sustainable Connectivity Portal

The ASEM Sustainable Connectivity Portal is an access point to a wealth of connectivity and sustainability-related data covering 51 countries members of the ASEM framework. The data is structured and combined to give overall measures of connectivity, sustainability and their various components, but also allows users to drill down to the underlying data. The data set is the product of many months of academic research, and amalgamates existing data with original research.

The interactive portal, along with its data and policy reports, can be found here.

AESCON Conference

AESCON (Asia-Europe Sustainable CONnectivity) was the first scientific conference on Asia-Europe sustainable connectivity, bringing together researchers and policy analysts working in the field of international connectivity, globalization and their impacts on sustainable development, with a particular focus on Asia-Europe connections.

AESCON, which took place online on September 22-25 2020, was the result of a joint effort by the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre, the European External Action Service, the European Commission’s Service for Foreign Policy Instruments (FPI), the Asia-Europe Foundation, The Economic Research Institute for ASEAN and East Asia and the Center for China and Globalization.

Videos, materials, and more details on the conference can be found here