Hesitancy in COVID-19 vaccine uptake and its associated factors among the general adult population: a cross-sectional study in six Southeast Asian countries

Background Vaccines are effective and reliable public health interventions against viral outbreaks and pandemics. However, hesitancy regarding the Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) vaccine is evident worldwide. Therefore, understanding vaccination-related behavior is critical in expanding the vaccine coverage to flatten the infection curve. This study explores the public perception regarding COVID-19 vaccination and identifies factors associated with vaccine hesitancy among the general adult populations in six Southeast Asian countries. Methods Using a snowball sampling approach, we conducted a descriptive cross-sectional study among 5260 participants in Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam between February and May 2021. Binary logistic regression analysis with a backward conditional approach was applied to identify factors associated with COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy. Results Of the total, 50.6% were female, and the median age was 30 years (range: 15–83 years). The majority of the participants believed that vaccination effectively prevents and controls COVID-19 (81.2%), and 84.0% would accept COVID-19 vaccines when they become available. They agreed that health providers’ advice (83.0%), vaccination convenience (75.6%), and vaccine costs (62.8%) are essential for people to decide whether to accept COVID-19 vaccines. About half (49.3%) expressed their hesitancy to receive the COVID-19 vaccines. After adjustment for other covariates, COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy was significantly associated with age, residential area, education levels, employment status, and family economic status. Participants from Indonesia, Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam were significantly more likely to express hesitancy in receiving COVID-19 vaccines than those from Philippines. Conclusions In general, participants in this multi-country study showed their optimistic perception of COVID-19 vaccines’ effectiveness and willingness to receive them. However, about half of them still expressed their hesitancy in getting vaccinated. The hesitation was associated with several socioeconomic factors and varied by country. Therefore, COVID-19 vaccination programs should consider these factors essential for increasing vaccine uptake in the populations.

Digital Marketplace as a New Frontier of Electronic Commerce

The digital marketplace is a major competitor now for the conventional marketplace especially in Southeast Asian countries (ASEAN) where digital marketplaces are booming and developing at an aggressive rate. The study also focuses on the challenges of eBay as a leading digital marketplace in battling their privacy and security threat, handling customer complaints about their services, or how government intervention provides an impact to their business, and competing with similar service provides. The other challenges are also associated with geographical distribution for marketing strategic location and why eBay should maintain their business like any other conventional business practices. Finally, the authors explore how concerned they are towards customer service as fundamental for any business.

E-Sports Industry in the Time of Green Digital Ecosystems

The phenomenon known as “eSports” has been growing in numbers in terms of revenue, market share, and popularity. This research aims to study this phenomenon in a larger scale which include findings from Southeast Asian countries such as Thailand and Singapore. The structure of the study will compromise of describing the eSports industry which is crucial to understanding the whole ecosystem of eSports, such as the economics behind the industry and the different roles that come under the industry. In order to do that, the application of a decision support systems tool is used to further study the future of eSports.

The Compromised Healthcare Sector of India and Other Southeast Asian Countries

This chapter aims to focus on the umpteen challenges in the healthcare sector of India which temper the possibility of partnerships with India and the 10 Southeast Asian countries. India's expenditure on the healthcare sector is only 1% of GDP, less than neighboring ASEAN countries. The Indian Government has privatised the healthcare sector. In the second wave of COVID-19, public and private hospitals are operating at full capacity with shortages of life-saving medicines, oxygen, ventilators, and vaccines. Lower middle-income groups and the poor are suffering the most. Nations of the world, medical scientific community, and pharmaceutical companies put their resources together to discover a vaccine for coronavirus within a year. To have an effective and sustainable model of doing business in healthcare, it is important to have partnerships and integrating best practices and innovations for improving and providing equitable and affordable access to healthcare.

Terrorism Eradication in ASEAN Countries: Human Rights Perspective

This research aims to discuss ASEAN counter-terrorism policy and its impact on human rights protection. The terrorism act of Abu Sayyaf in the Philippines, the spread of terrorism in Indonesia by JAT and JAD, and the rebellion movement in Pattani-Thailand are the most heard of terrorism cases in Southeast Asian countries. The research focused on the regulatory through comparative approaches. The result found that ASEAN has an agreement known as ASEAN Convention on Counter-Terrorism (ACCT) for combating terrorism. ACCT implementation in national legal regulations of ASEAN members in the midst of the spread of terrorism plays a crucial role in combating terrorism and its impact on human rights protection. However, the effort of eradicating terrorism in Southeast Asian countries is not in line with the principles of peace and regional integrity. The practice of authoritarianism and militarism has instead become most prominent as a result of perpetuating militarism-based legal regulations in resolving terrorism. Efforts for combating terrorism in Southeast Asia, therefore, leave a serious problem regarding the protection of human rights, the issue of impunity, attacks on civil society, and the involvement of the military which threatens territorial integrity. Those are at cross purposes with ACCT policies as well as national sovereignty, integrity, and security of ASEAN members. (Penelitian ini bertujuan membahas kebijakan anti-terorisme ASEAN dan dampaknya terhadap perlindungan hak asasi manusia. Aksi terorisme Abu Sayyaf di Filipina, penyebaran terorisme di Indonesia oleh JAT dan JAD, serta pemberontakan di Pattani-Thailand adalah kasus-kasus terorisme terpopuler yang terjadi di Asia Tenggara. Penelitian ini fokus pada peraturan perundang-undangan dengan pendekatan komparatif. Hasilnya menunjukkan bahwa ASEAN memiliki kesepakatan yang disebut Konvensi ASEAN tentang Kontra-Terorisme (ACCT) untuk memerangi terorisme. Penerapan ACCT dalam peraturan hukum nasional negara anggota ASEAN di tengah maraknya aksi terorisme sangat penting dalam upaya pemberantasan terorisme dan dampaknya terhadap perlindungan hak asasi manusia di ASEAN. Akan tetapi dalam praktiknya, pemberantasan terorisme di ASEAN masih belum sejalan dengan prinsip perdamaian dan keutuhan kawasan. Praktik otoritarianisme dan militerisme justru menjadi praktik paling menonjol yang dilakukan oleh negara-negara di ASEAN seiring dengan langgengnya regulasi hukum berbasis praktik militerisme dalam menyelesaikan kejahatan terorisme. Pemberantasan terorisme di Asia Tenggara menyisakan masalah serius terkait perlindungan hak asasi manusia, isu impunitas, serangan terhadap masyarakat sipil, dan keterlibatan militer yang mengancam integritas teritorial. Isu-isu tersebut bertentangan dengan Kebijakan ACCT serta kedaulatan, integritas nasional, dan keamanan anggota ASEAN.)

The Global Environmental Agenda of 2021 and the tasks of sustainable energy-ecological development and cooperation between Japan and countries Southeast Asia

The article discusses the main results of two major international summits held in October-November 2021, the key topics of which were the issues of the global fight against climate change and environmental protection. The decisions taken at these conferences, with the broad participation of world leaders, reflect the fundamental trends of the global environmental agenda. Within the framework of this agenda, Japan and the countries of Southeast Asia are building their modern energy and environmental cooperation. In this context, the article examines the main urgent tasks of energy-environmental interaction and sustainable development of Japan and the states of Southeast Asia. These countries are located in the Asia-Pacific region, which remains until now the main emitter of greenhouse gases in the world. However, the indicators of environmental pollution by Japan and the Southeast Asian countries are relatively not so high, compared to some other states in the region and the world. The article discusses the most relevant and significant examples of bilateral and multilateral cooperation between these countries in areas related to curbing global warming and climate protection. It has been revealed that with all the efforts made, since the 1990s, the indicators of reducing harmful emissions into the atmosphere in Japan remain modest and even lag behind some of the Western countries. The Southeast Asian countries show a serious attitude to the development of renewable energy, but their intention to abandon coal still raises some doubts about the methods of implementing this ambitious plan. In particular, it is currently not entirely clear whether these countries are preparing to make a full-fledged "energy transition" in the coming decades, or whether they just intend to replace their coal-fired thermal power plants with gas ones.

Institutional Change and Macroeconomic Variables in the ASEAN—Indonesia, Vietnam, and Cambodia: The Effects of a Trade War between China and USA

A trade war between the United States and China resulted in an increase in trade tariffs on imported goods entering each of these countries. Southeast Asian countries that have trade relations with the two countries, especially in terms of non-oil and gas exports of 25% to 35%, will be affected by export demand. Furthermore, the effects of the trade war will reduce gross domestic product (GDP) in Southeast Asian countries or the ASEAN and increase the current account deficit. On the other hand, the effects of the trade war that led to the decision of foreign investors to move their manufacturing base out of China will produce a flow of foreign investment that is ready to be captured by every ASEAN country.

More than just a regime type: how Southeast Asian countries respond to COVID-19

As early as the pandemic has spread to Southeast Asian countries and elsewhere, observers have been tempted to associate regime type with COVID-19 responses. This trend encompasses the debate between democratic vs. authoritarian regimes that has been particularly helpful in identifying the normative basis to global pandemic responses. However, it leads into an inquiry whether the comparison of regime as part of variable isolation is scientifically viable in assessing the public policy, given the fact that the comparative matrix is vague. The comparison between democracy and the authoritarian regime will not bring a fair debate, but only to insinuate epistemological obstacle due to socially constructed dichotomy between the two even if the authoritarian regime has done any good practice. Furthermore, such a dichotomy only reflects a binary oversimplification of reality, which neglects an alternative explanation. Drawing on the framework of typology of COVID-19 responses by Greer et. al. (2020)–which includes four key foci, i.e., social policies and crisis management, regime type, formal political institutions, state capacity–this article will extend the framework by applying to the case of Southeast Asian countries, where these countries share similar structure and challenges, yet some countries arguably have been more successful.

MACROECONOMIC DETERMINANTS OF TAX REVENUE AND TAX EFFORT IN SOUTHEAST ASIAN COUNTRIES

This paper analyzes macroeconomic indicators that determine tax revenues in six Southeast Asian countries during 2008 – 2019. The estimation results are then used to predict the value of taxable capacity to construct the deal of tax effort. Using the FE model equipped with the Driscoll-Kraay standard errors, this study finds positive and significant effects of per capita income, manufacturing, and trade openness on the actual tax-to-GDP ratio and tax effort. In contrast, inflation is considered a different determinant because of its insignificant effect on the two measures of tax performance. In addition, the authors also classify countries into three other groups based on the actual level of tax revenue and the effort put into collecting taxes. The benchmarks used to rank countries are all sample countries’ median substantial tax revenue and the tax effort index 1. Regardless of the classification, several policy implications are offered to increase tax collection productivity by focusing on the revenue bases used in the estimation model. Keywords: Tax Revenue, Tax Capacity, Tax Effort, Southeast Asia, Panel DataJEL: H2, O1, O2

Building Integrated Photovoltaic (BIPV) in Southeast Asian Countries: Review of Effects and Challenges

Fossil fuel consumption for electricity generation in the building sector is at an all-time high in line with the country’s economic growth. This scenario will increase the global CO2 emissions and large carbon footprints, thus leading to global warming. In recent years, most of the research related to the building sector has focused on the development of new techniques to reduce buildings’ energy consumption through energy conservation, energy efficiency, and the implementation of renewable energy technologies. The introduction of photovoltaic (PV) technology has become the most prominent renewable energy (RE) that can be integrated into building components. Even though the Building Integrated Photovoltaic (BIPV) has been available for decades, but its implementation in Southeast Asian countries has not gained widespread acceptance compared to European countries and other parts of Asia. This paper aims to investigate the effects and challenges of BIPV implementation in Southeast Asian Countries (Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam, and the Philippines), focusing on climate effects, the initial cost of PV technology, government policies, and initiatives. An in-depth literature review from past research, policies, and reports taken between 2016 to 2021 has been conducted and found that the environmental parameters directly influence the performance of BIPV systems and affect efficiency. This study pointed at Feed-in Tariff (FiT), policies and initiatives offered by the government in Southeast Asian countries are not beneficial and discourage building owners to adopt the BIPV technology or any other RE technology. Governments should revise the current policies to promote and attract more building owners to take part in the efforts to minimize CO2 emissions from the building industry.