Globalization of Production and the Competitiveness of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises in Asia and the Pacific: Trends and Prospects

This paper focuses on a key dynamic that is changing the business environment: the globalization of production, which has major implications for the growth prospects of SMEs in Asia and the Pacific. The current global economic environment is characterized by trade liberalization, rapidly changing technology, and growing and ever-mutating demand for higher-quality and differentiated intermediate and final products and services that must meet increasingly stringent international standards. Traditional SMEs find it difficult to stay competitive in such an environment, even in their domestic markets. Conversely, by facilitating linkages with foreign buyers and large multinational enterprises, the forces of globalization loosen the constraints of domestic economies and markets, and provide local SMEs with potential access to globally distributed assets, including information, technology, skills, capital and markets.