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MPDD Seminar Series on
"Southeast Asian Economic Outlook:
With Perspectives on China and India"
by
Dr. Kensuke Tanaka
OECD Development Centre, France
Thursday, 29 November 2012
14:00-15:30 hours
MPDD Meeting room 7B, Secretariat Building
United Nations Building, Bangkok
Growth for the ten ASEAN economies will be 5.5% over the 2013-2017 period, a robust rate matching the pre-crisis level of 2000-2007. However, Southeast Asian governments should act to narrow social and economic disparities between countries in the region to sustain robust growth, according to OECD Southeast Asian Economic Outlook: with Perspectives on China and India, 2013 edition. Domestic demand growth, and particularly private consumption and investment, will be the main driver of growth in most ASEAN countries.
The region faces an issue of disparities between and within countries, which needs to be addressed. Narrowing development gaps means reducing disparities between the two groups of countries, ASEAN-6 (Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand) and CLMV countries (Cambodia, Lao, Myanmar and Viet Nam), as well as within each countries.
Development gaps go beyond income levels. It encompasses several dimensions of life including infrastructure, tourism, trade and investment, ICT, human resources, and poverty. In particular, disparities are at their widest in poverty and human resource development and greater efforts are required in those areas.
Kensuke Tanaka is the Head of the Asia Desk of the OECD Development Centre (in France). He is in charge of several publications including the annual publication “Southeast Asian Economic Outlook with Perspectives on China and India”, “Revenue statistics, trends and policy challenges in Asia” and the quarterly bulletin “This Quarter in Asia”. He also leads several related projects including the construction of indicators, for instance the Asian Business Cycle Indicators (ABCIs), the Medium-term Projection Framework for Growth and Development (MPF) and the ASEAN-OECD Narrowing Development Gaps Indicators (NDGIs).
Before joining the OECD Development Centre, Mr. Tanaka was a Programme Manager at the OECD, Centre for Co-operation with Non-members. He also worked at a public research institute and taught at a university in Japan as well as at Sciences Po (Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris) in France.
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