With the vision of advancing together as one community, delegates from the ASEAN member states convened on June 26 – 27, 2014 for the 1^st  ASEAN – Network for Drugs, Diagnostics, Vaccines, and Traditional Medicine Innovation (ASEAN-NDI) Community of Practice on Traditional Medicine Meeting at Dusit Thani Hotel, Makati City, Philippines.

Presenting the ASEAN-NDI initiatives, Dr. Jaime C. Montoya, the ASEAN-NDI Secretariat Coordinator, emphasized the need to develop collaborative innovations on traditional medicine in addressing the escalating cost and poor access to modern medicine, which were prevalent in some ASEAN countries.

“There is also a constraint on the lack of research on varieties of traditional medicine [though] the government gives a lot of support for traditional medicine,” added by Dr. Habibah A. Wahab, the Director General of Malaysian Institute of Pharmaceuticals and Nutraceuticals.

Supporting collaborative initiatives on traditional medicine, ASEAN-NDI representatives affirmed their interests on potential areas for collaborations, particularly on Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), capacity-building for researchers and students, harmonization of policies and regulations, and research and development (R&D) projects.

Nine (9) delegates from the ASEAN Member States (Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao PDR, Malaysia, Philippines,  Singapore, Thailand, and Viet Nam), and some participants from the Department of Health, and Department of Science and Technology graced this remarkable meeting.