The increased intensity of extreme weather events such as tropical cyclones, droughts, and floods has expanded disaster risks in the ASEAN Plus Three region, which subsequently threatened people's lives and livelihoods across the region. Throughout the year 2022, natural disasters frequently occurred in several countries in the region, mostly in Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Thailand, Viet Nam, China, and Japan, which were categorised as very high natural disaster risk countries. Afterwards, natural disasters exacerbated people’s struggles, leading to regional cooperations.

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 Food security is defined by the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) as “when all people, at all times, have physical, social, and economic access to sufficient, safe, and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life”. Its framework consists of four elements: food availability, access to food, the stability of food supplies and price, and food utilisation, including food security and nutrition. In a global perspective, most of ASEAN Plus Three (APT) countries are generally seen as fertile countries which can produce a variety of food for domestic consumption and export to the world market. However, food security situations in the APT today have been vulnerable so far.

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The ASEAN Plus Three Emergency Rice Reserve (APTERR), in 2021, is going to celebrate its 10^th anniversary of establishment as a regional mechanism that strengthens food security and reduces poverty in the ASEAN Plus Three region (APT). With tremendous passions and efforts from the member countries as well as other relevant parties being put into it, the APTERR now develops and settles itself as one of the most reliable and reputable mechanisms to help assist people during times of emergency caused by disasters, which includes human-induce hazard, through many effective rice-providing programmes. Nevertheless, an efficiency of the programme improvement is always essential for the APTERR activities. That is why this article is going to discuss about potential ways for further improving the works of the organisation in 2021, particularly the implementations of Tier 1 and 2, the achievements of which are seemed to be far off from what they have been expected.

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