8TH ASEAN CHINA YOUNG ENTREPRENEURS FORUM

KUALA LUMPUR, MALAYSIA

WELCOMING SPEECH
FOR THE WELCOMING DINNER

Dato Lokman Hakim Bin Ali

Secretary General of Ministry of Youth & Sports Malaysia

12th August 2016

Friday
Auditorium, Ministry of Finance

The Respectable, Dato Muzammir Mustafa

The President of Malaysia Graduates Entrepreneur Association,

Delegates from ASEAN countries and China,

Committee Members, Distinguished Guest, Ladies & Gentlemen

Assalammualaikum W.B.T & a very good evening to everyone.

It is indeed a great honour and pleasure for me to welcome all of you this evening to the
official dinner of the 8th ASEAN China Youth Entrepreneurs Forum.

I wish to extend warmest thanks and appreciation to the Malaysia Graduates

Entrepreneur Association, for hosting our dinner this evening and the coming forum.

Our dinner tonight marks the first day of a very successful forum and behalf of the
Ministry of Youth & Sports, we would like to take this opportunity to reiterate our thanks
and appreciation to all our distinguished delegates and guest speakers for coming all
the way to Malaysia. Thanks to all the global and regional corporate partners who have
supported this important forum throughout the years on all our initiatives and
programmes in educating young entrepreneurs.

Distinguished Guests, Ladies & Gentlemen,

I believe that all of you are aware that we should highlight the important role of young
entrepreneurs as engines of economic growth and as a powerful force for change in the
region. Tonights dinner and tomorrows forum are an important opportunities for ASEAN
countries, China and our international guests over the globe to attain a greater
understanding of the challenges and opportunities for achieving sustainable growth and
economic empowerment for young entrepreneurs.

In keeping with the ASEANs commitment to promoting business-friendly policies to

greatly ease market entry for young entrepreneurs and investors, we should realize that
we are all meeting at a very critical time for the ASEAN region and also a time of great
economic and financial concern for the world economy at large.

The ASEAN community has no doubt created many new opportunities but also many
challenges as well. Thus, these challenges spur us all to double our efforts to keep the
channels of trade and investment open between the ASEAN region and China which
has been known for being so pertinent in producing young entrepreneurs. Therefore, we
must ensure that the ASEAN young entrepreneurs are fully engaged with this process,
and are encouraged to set up successful business fields.

In the end, I believe we all agree that a thriving and dynamic ASEAN and China
networking for this forum will open for business, and engaged in trade, will generate the
growth and prosperity that the region needs and that the region truly deserves to have.
Im wishing all the young entrepreneurs here tonight the best of luck and fruitful forum.

Thank you.