Asia's Developing Future

Recent financial crises have highlighted the need to update the global institutions for financial and economic oversight that were founded more than 70 years ago, and their Asian counterparts that have been developing over the last 20 years. The evolution of financial markets and monetary policy makes it increasingly obvious that the coordination between organizations as well as the organizations...

Asia and the Pacific have deepened economic integration through trade and foreign direct investment since the early 1990s. But financial market integration within the region has not progressed as quickly. ADBI research examining cross-border portfolio assets and liabilities in Asia and the Pacific from 2001 to 2017 shows that rapid increases in portfolio foreign assets and liabilities have taken p...

Strong and consistent incentives and greater policy stability and coordination between levels of government are needed to engender green energy financing in New Zealand and Australia, according to the Asian Development Bank Institute. New Zealand, on the face of it, looks impressive with a generating mix of over 80% renewables, but this is largely the legacy of state intervention in decades past a...

The International Monetary Fund learned a thing or two from the 1997 Asian financial crisis, which helped it respond better to the 2008 global financial crisis. Thanks to IMF assistance, troubled countries were in a better position to weather the global crisis. The IMF provided financing to more than 30 countries that saw investors and capital flee financial markets. On average, IMF financing afte...

One of India’s major exports can readily be seen in computer science faculties, at information technology events, or among programmers and developers in most parts of the world—the IT professional. India is a major global supplier of IT professionals, especially to Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development member countries, but stricter immigration policies in countries, including the...

China’s financial system is developing rapidly, swelling the country’s bank assets to become the largest in the world, and there are worrying similarities with the global dominance of Japan’s banks in the late 1980s. Japan’s experience ended in tears with the bursting of a domestic and international financial and real asset bubble, heralding the economy’s descent into on-and-off recessions for the...

Central banks and regulators should be on the frontline of fighting the carbon emissions driving climate change, and a more proactive approach can address the visible side effects in Asia, such as the annual choking smoke haze that envelops parts of the region. Authorities should take account of climate risks as part of their duties of oversight, and “green finance” should play a major role in ens...

Developing economies often lack sophisticated equity markets, meaning that firms that are focused on innovation must rely on bank lending. But tight bank policies can undermine the culture of innovation that is essential to growth. Research conducted for the Asian Development Bank Institute concludes that deregulation creates a dynamic banking sector that, depending on the development stage, can e...

Businesses around the world need to pay closer attention to technology, design, branding, and other forms of intangible assets, if they want an edge over their competitors in keeping customers interested. About a third of the value of goods manufactured globally comes from intangible capital, highlighting the need for businesses to protect the intellectual property of these types of assets to stay...

With aging becoming a pressing issue in many countries, especially in Asia, governments need better indicators that track the well-being of the elderly to craft policies to better meet the needs of the aged. Many countries do not have the data needed for sound policy making, planning, and investment targeting, which leads to piecemeal public policies with little sense of priority. The People’s Rep...

World oil price volatility affects the economies of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries as well as their non-OPEC counterparts, but little attention is paid to non-OPEC economies, which don’t have a formal bloc to lobby for them. But non-OPEC energy exporters have taken a more significant role as oil demand has increased since the late 1990s. OPEC is no longer the main exporter, and...

Fintech or, more fully, financial technology, is the buzz word in the startup world. But while the winners in this revolution are entrepreneurs and investors, there are clear benefits for the developing world. According to a new book from the Asian Development Bank Institute, Labor Migration in Asia: Increasing the Development Impact of Migration through Finance and Technology, lowering the cost o...

Headlines about the rebirth of a trans-Pacific trade pact in Santiago, Chile in March have concentrated on the absence of the United States from the 11-nation agreement, or the trade gains expected for each of its signatories. But those aren’t the only issues at stake in the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP-11, signed among Australia, Brunei Darussalam,...

As parts of the developed world tighten foreign worker laws and maintain a hostile rhetoric against “immigrants” and “refugees,” a new report shows Asian migrant workers add economic value to their new countries. US President Donald Trump is sending troops to the Mexican border to clamp down on unauthorized arrivals, and European leaders face a backlash for liberal migration policies, but Asian De...

Ghost cities full of empty apartment blocks are evidence of the central government’s failure to slow booming house construction in the People’s Republic of China. Conflicting incentives for local government officials, and a lack of alternative investments in China, have meant even the toughest of restrictions haven’t been able to stop developers building ever more houses. The housing industry is a...

A growth slowdown in the People’s Republic of China causing a decline in trade would be felt across Asia, with commodity exporters and trade partners closest to the country hit hardest. Although the region’s dependence on trade with China has been expanding fast, the effects of such a slowdown would not be catastrophic, says a new book published by the Asian Development Bank Institute. Read the tr...

Domestic structural change is necessary if the People's Republic of China is to sustain economic growth of as high as 8% a year over the next 10 years. Research published in an Asian Development Bank Institute book, Slowdown in the People’s Republic of China, Structural Factors and the Implications for Asia, found the worldwide trade slowdown that followed the global financial crisis in 2008 is mo...

The bulk of Asia’s exports runs through, rather than to, the People’s Republic of China, leaving the region more exposed to downturns and anti-trade sentiments in developed countries than to a domestic slowdown in China. Governments should promote domestic growth and trade within Asia to lessen that exposure, economists argue in a new book by the Asian Development Bank Institute, Slowdown in the P...

The nature of the People’s Republic of China’s growth slowdown is a key question for the global economy. If it’s a bump in the road, growth in China should soon return to a high rate that can help support global growth. If it reflects deeper problems, the world may have to live without the contribution that has come to be expected from China’s hard-charging economy. Economists must first determine...

The People’s Republic of China needs to refocus its economy to avoid slipping into an economic downturn that could be worse than the one Japan has suffered for more than the past 2 decades. Comparing the experience of the two countries shows that China faces many of the same issues that prompted the beginning of Japan’s long economic slide in the early 1990s. While some differences could help Chin...

Hundreds of thousands of children in Indonesia are growing taller and heavier thanks to the government’s rice subsidy program, which ensures better nutrition despite flaws in the scheme. The government started RASKIN—rice for the poor—in 1998 to help poor and near-poor families cope with high food prices in the wake of the Asian financial crisis. Under the program, currently the largest in-kind su...

Green bonds, which first appeared in 2007, finance projects that deliver environmental or climate benefits such as climate change mitigation and adaptation investments. The global green bond market is rapidly growing, from $3 billion in 2012 to more than $100 billion in 2017. The Nordic region, particularly Sweden, Norway, and Finland, has pioneered the issuance of green bonds and used specific me...

Negative interest rates in Japan are leading banks, pension funds, and other investors to look overseas for better returns, but they are mostly ignoring developing Asia, and with rates rising in the US and Europe, that is unlikely to change. Alicia Garcia-Herrero, a prominent economist who has worked at the International Monetary Fund and is now chief economist for Asia-Pacific at the French inves...

Ultra-low or negative interest rates in Japan, the United States, and Europe placed a difficult burden on other central banks and may threaten their independence in the future. Veerathai Santiprabhob, governor of the Bank of Thailand, told the annual conference of the Asia Development Bank Institute that, with interest rates low, central banks have taken to using macroprudential tools. They are ti...

Central banks are running out of wiggle room, having lowered interest rates, in some cases to zero or negative, and are losing influence over markets becoming accustomed to a low-rate regime. “Forward guidance” is losing traction. Narayana Kocherlakota, former president of the Minneapolis Federal Reserve Bank, says central banks can try to guide public perception by hinting at their intentions, a...