(VOVworld) – The primary goal of establishing ASEAN was eventually to form an ASEAN Community. The roadmap to an ASEAN Community has reached its final stage with a high degree of commitment from all 10 members’ leaders. It is now crucial to increase public awareness of the importance of the transformation from Association to Community and the benefits it will bring them.

“I’ve heard about ASEAN integration but not much about how it was prepared for or what has been done so far”.

“I imagine that when the Community is established, people in Vietnam will be able to buy products from other ASEAN countries and vice versa. This should help to strengthen mutual understanding between people in ASEAN”.

The lack of awareness about the Community is a challenge to the establishment of an ASEAN Socio-Cultural Society (ASCC). A recent survey by the ASEAN Secretariat showed that only 80% of people in urban areas had heard about the ASEAN Community and 76% of the respondents said they know nothing about its purpose. It is a concern that only one third of ASEAN’s population understands the benefits of the ASEAN Community.

Former Deputy Foreign Minister Le Cong Phung, President of the Vietnam-ASEAN Friendship Association, said: “the ASEAN Community is not a community of leaders and governments but a community of the people of ASEAN countries. It must be people-oriented. I think that there should be more people-to-people exchanges. Communications concerning the Community should be stepped up.”

ASEAN members have conducted many awareness-raising activities, including people-to-people exchanges, seminars, exhibitions, and the establishment of ASEAN libraries in schools. Each country has produced documentary films on the history and development of ASEAN and its 10 members and the cultural similarities within ASEAN.

Indonesian Ambassador to Vietnam Mayerfas said “what we have been doing is to reach as many people as possible to explain to them about ASEAN, and to get their input. The goal is to make them understand about ASEAN, its development and progress. The main goal is to make our people not only think of themselves as citizens of their city, their provinces, their country-Indonesia, but also to think of themselves as ASEAN citizens.”

This year an ASEAN Culture Center will be established in each member nation and the first such center will be inaugurated in Thailand on August 8, 2015. Young people in ASEAN are contributing significantly to the transformation of ASEAN from Association to Community. Many young Vietnamese are aware that they will need to learn new skills in the context of integration.

Phuong Linh of Hanoi National University said: “I think that my qualifications can meet the requirements of labor markets in ASEAN and the world. I have taken courses on soft skills and English”.

Connecting people and building a society that serves the people are ASEAN’s most important goals. An ASEAN Community with cultural diversity within unity is being shaped thanks to concrete actions by each government and efforts by each and every citizen.