Last week its five-day National Development Conference brought together 170 participants from political parties, government agencies and the academe. Last week Taiwan joined the lengthening list of newly industrialized economies devising plans for growth and competitiveness. We have not seen in the last decade or so the sort of downgrades in growth and export forecasts we saw last year." So even if the boom seems safe for now, the region's leaders, planners and bosses have adopted a common New Year's resolution: We have to get tougher and smarter. Still, says Ranjan Pal, regional economist for Jardine Fleming Securities, "1996 was a tremendously sobering experience. Thailand's 7% and Taiwan's 6.5% will show a substantial surge, while the Philippines' 6.6% would continue its turnaround performance in recent years. Malaysia comes in second, with an 8.2% rise, up marginally from last year. Leading the region, China is tipped to return to a 10.5% rate. "In 1997 exports will recover very well," predicts Amnuay, whose country is among the most worried about long-term growth.Ī World Bank report, titled "Is the East Asian 'Miracle' Over?", declared last year's slump to be temporary and "the fundamentals still in place for the world's fastest-growing economies." Several nations touched by economic fears in 1996 are forecast to accelerate GDP growth this year. "We are adjusting to more sustainable growth of 7%." As 1996 ended, there were signs that the pall over exports was at last lifting, particularly in semiconductors, a major culprit for the slowdown. "No country can keep its economy growing 8% to 9% forever," Thai Deputy Premier and Finance Minister Amnuay Viravan told Asiaweek. Its 7%-8% overall annual growth these days, while below the double digits of the 1980s, remains enviable. The region had in fact rebounded from far worse downturns in the past. So when Asian exports slowed last year, it was seen not just as another trough in the business cycle, but as a wake-up call to address fundamental weaknesses threatening growth. Krugman's "The Myth of Asia's Miracle" asserted that the boom did not raise TFP much and would peter out as factors of production dwindled. TFP is a measure of how much economic value is created in using factors of production like money, land, resources, labor and technology. His seminal 1994 article in the journal Foreign Affairs focused Asia's attention on the need to boost productivity - "total factor productivity," to be exact. The region has Stanford University economist Paul Krugman partly to thank for its get-tougher push. So when the much-anticipated Pacific Century begins, Asian enterprises aim to be leaner, more innovative and responsive, boasting smarter people, better facilities and higher technology. State and private-sector efforts to alleviate rising costs, the shortage in skills and expertise, infrastructure bottlenecks and other drags on competitiveness are among the principal forces recasting regional business. Perhaps the best indication of the region's resurgence is its biggest worry in recent years: Can its economies and enterprises continue leading the rest of the world?Īs it happens, that burning issue, kindled in late 1994 by a California academic's essay and fanned by Asia's export slowdown last year, is lighting the way to the next century for the New Asian Economy. In less than three generations, Asia has emerged from war and colonialism and regained a leading role on the global stage. W HAT WILL ASIA'S ECONOMY be like in the year 2000? As the dawn of a new millennium approaches, the region's political and business leaders, planners, entrepreneurs, workers and thinkers can look back with pride at half a century of a kind of restoration. So why is it picking fights?Īs a new millennium nears, Asia aims to be even harder to beat From Our Correspondent: Hirohito and the WarĪ conversation with biographer Herbert Bixįrom Our Correspondent: A Rough Road Aheadīad news for the Philippines - and some others
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |