The United Nations recognizes that productivity capacity building is the key for self-sustained growth and graduation of LDCs in Asia and the Pacific. To achieve this objective, substantial financing must be mobilized to invest in infrastructure, social development and climate change challenges....

The subprime mortgage crisis erupted in the United States in mid-2007 and was then transformed into the global financial crisis after the failure of Lehman Brothers in September 2008. The total amount of write-downs of loans and securities by financial institutions for 2007-2010 is estimated to...

Foreign capital flows have emerged as key channels of global economic integration all across the world over the past two decades. While foreign direct investment (FDI) flows have been undertaken for a long time by multinational enterprises (MNEs) in the course of their overseas expansion,...

This paper examines the impact of workers’ remittances on growth and poverty reduction in developing Asia-Pacific countries using panel data over the period 1993-2003. The results suggests that, while remittances do have a significant impact on poverty reduction through increasing income,...

The ongoing euro zone debt crisis creates an undesirable scenario for the global economy as well as for the Asia-Pacific region given that the region has close economic linkages. The paper aims to provide quantitative estimates of the potential impact of the euro zone debt crisis on merchandise...

High food prices have put increasing inflationary pressures across the Asia-Pacific region and threatened food security. Bad weather in important food-producing countries and speculation in commodity markets have affected global food supplies and added volatility to booming commodity markets...

Since its first meeting in December 1999 in Berlin, the Group of 20 or G20 has come a long way to establish its relevance, credibility and emerge as a premier council for global economic cooperation. Initially set up as a group of Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors of systemically...

This paper analyses the effect of public and private health expenditures on the achievement of health-related MDGs. It finds that three quarters of the variation of health-related MDG indicators can be explained by public and private health expenditure per capita when controlling for levels of...

The paper provides quantitative estimates of the productive capacities of the countries in the Asia- Pacific region and their evolution in the past 25 years. It updates the results for 2009 presented in the ESCAP’s Economic and Social Survey of Asia and the Pacific 2011 and details the...

This paper estimates the impact of the high food prices of 2010 on income poverty and the achievement of MDG 1 in Asia and the Pacific. It also estimates the impacts of high price during 2011 under various scenarios for the prices of food and oil. We find that although the high food prices of...