From Thai food producers seeking new buyers to researchers developing more resilient crops, Asia’s shared future depends on practical connections. Thailand’s Asia Cooperation Dialogue offers a meeting place for those ambitions—but its value rests on turning diplomatic goodwill into opportunities people can use.
A Wider Table for Cooperation
Launched in Cha-Am, Thailand, in June 2002, the Asia Cooperation Dialogue brought together 18 Asian foreign ministers. Its membership has since grown to 35 countries, connecting Southeast Asia with partners across East, South, Central and West Asia. Its founding purpose was to complement existing organisations, rather than create a competing bloc.
That breadth gives Thailand a distinctive diplomatic platform. ASEAN concentrates on Southeast Asia; the ACD opens conversations with countries whose energy resources, markets, research capabilities and investment priorities extend across the continent.
Thailand resumed the chairmanship in 2025, promoting innovation and sustainable growth. The dialogue’s six cooperation pillars cover connectivity; science and technology; education; food, water and energy security; culture and tourism; and inclusive, sustainable development. Together, they recognise that economic resilience depends on connections between sectors as well as countries.
Turning Shared Ambitions into Skills
Some of the clearest evidence of cooperation comes from classrooms rather than summit halls.
In May 2025, Thailand’s International Cooperation Agency organised a creative-economy course at Naresuan University for 16 participants from 12 ACD countries. In July, another programme brought 15 participants from eight countries to Rangsit University to study food technology and future food production.
These are modest numbers, but tangible activities. They show how a broad diplomatic forum can support exchanges among officials and specialists working on problems shared across Asia.
For Southeast Asian economies, the potential applications are immediate: helping food processors improve production, connecting researchers with overseas counterparts, and enabling local enterprises to learn from different markets. Whether training produces lasting commercial or community benefits, however, depends on what participants can implement after returning home.
Opening Doors Across the Continent
Thailand’s approach links domestic opportunity with wider diplomatic relationships.
At an October 2024 event launching Thailand’s OECD accession process, then foreign minister Maris Sangiampongsa explained: “we want to use economic diplomacy also to strengthen our role as bridge-builder between all partners.” He identified the ACD among the platforms supporting that ambition.
For Thailand and its Southeast Asian neighbours, such bridge-building can create space to discuss food markets, energy transitions and transport connections with a wider range of partners. It also allows smaller economies to participate in conversations extending beyond their immediate region.
Yet opportunities should not be confused with completed outcomes. A dialogue does not itself finance a railway, guarantee stable energy supplies or establish common payment systems. Those results require separate agreements, investment, technical standards and implementation.
Making Connections Last
The underlying challenge is broader than infrastructure.
Speaking at an Asian cooperation summit in 2014, Thai diplomat Sihasak Phuangketkeow observed: “Closer economic integration requires us to redouble our efforts in promoting connectivity in all its dimensions.” His argument encompassed transport links and connections between people.
That remains a useful test for the ACD. Its voluntary approach can make participation easier for countries with different priorities. But flexibility also makes sustained follow-through essential. Training partnerships need continuity; proposed projects need accountable partners; and public claims need evidence of benefits.
Thailand’s strongest contribution would be to make those benefits visible: useful knowledge exchanged, partnerships maintained and local enterprises better equipped to reach new markets. Asia’s diversity gives the dialogue its purpose. Practical delivery will give it lasting credibility.
