ABSTRACT
‘King Commodity’ has long been a byword for the business side of Southeast Asia and continues to be its commercial alter ego. For half a millennium the exploitation of raw materials, including minerals, had determined the political and economic face of the region. The Asean region’s two-decade-old boom owes much to the flow from the world’s most abundant commodity cornucopia. Ruined by debt, ravaged by the cronies of successive governments, deforested of its chief resource and selling gas on fixed contract to Japan, Sabah in the 1980s became a mute reminder of a faltering rush to wealth that had been based on a plentiful flow of money down the commodity cornucopia. Malaysia stands out in its success in redirecting crude palm oil exports away from distant Europe and into its own refineries. Yet Southeast Asia’s slow pace in achieving more downstream processing, more product diversification, more control over marketing and distribution has surprised many outside economists.
