The 17th APEC Future Education Forum (AFEF) and the 19th International ALCoB Conference were held from 28 September (Tuesday) to 1 October (Friday) in a virtual manner. The annual forum and conference serve as an invaluable opportunity to discuss future directions of education and human resources development in the Asia-Pacific region. Since 2005, the forum and conference have served their role as the largest and longest thematic meeting in the APEC Human Resources Development Working Group (HRDWG). The 2021 forum and conference have gathered 780 participants from 20 APEC member economies, guest economies and international institutions. Under the theme “Strengthening lifelong competencies and skills development for individuals’ career, education, training, and life cycles”, the forum and conference reflected the current educational agenda from 21 APEC member economies and other international organizations such as G20, UNESCO. As a way forward, the forum and conference speakers recommend APEC to 1) consider individual and industrial needs for curriculum development, 2) expand lifelong learning policies and practices at both domestic and international level and 3) develop a public-private partnership to prepare its future talents with adequate competencies. This review explains the 17th AFEF and the 19th International ALCoB Conference background, summary and outcomes. The review also briefs on collective actions member economies can take as future steps to continue the forum and conference discussions.

The Asia-Pacific region is an engine of global growth in political, economic, social and cultural aspects but tangible and intangible conflicts also remain in the region due to different backgrounds and experiences in history, culture, and so forth. In this respect, APEC has played its role to narrow divides and facilitate cooperative activities among 21 member economies since 1989. However, it is required to point out how these member economies can initiate and manage cooperative activities efficiently under challenging situations like recent economic crisis and remaining conflicts. This paper presents the role of education to enable member economies to understand each other and find a way to work together, and reviews one representative international educational APEC project: APEC Future Education Forum.