ABSTRACT
Foreign direct investment (FDI) plays an increasingly important part in the economies of the Asian region.1 Over the last twenty-five years, there has been a marked increase in FDI into and out of East, Southeast and South Asia (see Table 11.1). Investment into these parts of Asia was relatively low in 1993 (US$54 billion), but had increased sevenfold by 2013 to $384 billion. Outbound investment increased from $44 billion to more than $430 billion during this period. While China and Hong Kong account for a substantial amount of the increase, and the ability of countries in the region to attract and to make investments varies considerably, the overall trend has been towards growth across the three sub-regions. Outbound investment has also increased considerably, although again much of the growth is attributable to North Asia. In 2012, North and Southeast Asia accounted for 24 per cent of the world’s total FDI inflows and 20 per cent of outflows (UNCTAD, 2013). Using a different measure, in 2013, inflows to the twenty-one economies in the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) group – including Canada, the United States, Mexico, Peru, Australia and Russia – constituted 54 per cent of the world’s total FDI inflows (UNCTAD, 2014b). Intra-Asian investment has also increased significantly (ASEAN, 2013b).
