Southeast Asia could hit $5 trillion growth mark

Bloomberg

Southeast Asia’s been home to almost half of the biggest growth drivers in the past half-century. To keep investors interested, it’ll have to make the right moves across technology, education and infrastructure, according to Diaan-Yi Lin, a senior partner at McKinsey & Co.
Among 71 developing economies of the past half-century, 18 are responsible for the lion’s share of growth, with eight of those within Southeast Asia, a September McKinsey report showed. With the right policy mix, these economies could double their gross domestic product to almost $5 trillion over the next decade, or about 5 percent of the global economy, the analysts found.
Lin sees two categories of Southeast Asia economies: the so-called ‘CLMV’ countries — Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Vietnam — that grew over 5 percent in a two-decade span through 2016, and the others — Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore and Indonesia — that kept up about a 3.5 percent pace in the 50-year span from 1965.
Lin sees two factors that have bolstered the region since 1965. The first, and more important, is capital accumulation — domestic savings and foreign direct investment (FDI).
“That’s the basis of the virtuous productivity and growth cycle — you can invest, investment leads to income, allows for further investment, allows for innovation,” she said.
Secondly, the role of large companies — those with more than $500 million in revenue. About two-thirds of the companies at the top of the food chain were rotating out of that echelon, meaning there was healthy turnover rather than monopolies that restricted dynamic growth, Lin said.
The concentration of state-owned enterprises — particularly in Indonesia and Vietnam — “begs a big question of the level of competition that these SOEs are subjected to may need to be increased,” she added.