Three members of the Yokosuka Council on Asia Pacific Studies were invited to speak at the Ocean Science & Technology Industry Forum 2026, organised by Taiwan’s Ocean Affairs Council in Taipei City on September 7-8, 2026. The members were Charlie Brown, Director, Southeast Asia Regional Programs, YCAPS; Scott Edwards, Lecturer, University of Malaya, and Senior Research Fellow at YCAPS; and Robert Mizo, Assistant Professor, University of Delhi and Distinguished Research Fellow at YCAPS.
The event was inaugurated by Ms Bi-Ling Kuan, Minister of the Ocean Affairs Council, Taiwan, who graciously welcomed all the attendees and stressed the importance of maritime security for Taiwan and its expanding technological capacity in the maritime domain. Deputy Minister of OAC, Chen En-Sung moderated the inaugural session on Marine Safety.
Dr Charlie Brown and Dr Scott Edwards spoke during the session titled “Safe Ocean: Protecting the Blue.” Dr Brown shared his insights on “New Paradigms of Maritime Domain Awareness and Information Sharing,” exploring emerging pathways to strengthen maritime domain awareness and knowledge co-production. Dr Edwards’ talk was titled “Bringing maritime communities together for maritime security provision”, through which he explored practices to bring maritime communities together and offered pathways to realising maritime security, which he approached as a “whole-of-system/society” activity. Dr Robert Mizo spoke in the third session titled Sustainable Ocean: Thriving Together with Nature. His talk, “Towards Maritime Resilience: pathways for regional cooperation and engagement,” explored the need for, and ways to, pursue interstate cooperation on maritime resilience in the age of cascading maritime crises.
