Thailand: The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has highlighted Asia as a key driver of global economic growth, accounting for nearly two-thirds of global growth and benefiting from the worldwide artificial intelligence (AI) boom.
Speaking at the IMF and World Bank annual meetings in Bangkok, Krishna Srinivasan, director of the IMF's Asia and Pacific Department, highlighted the region's economic dynamism and improvements in policy frameworks and institutions over recent decades.
Referring to an IMF book he co-authored, Toward a New Economic Growth Model for China, Srinivasan stressed China's role in driving regional growth.
"If you look at this book on China, we talk about the success China has had in pursuing this investment and export-led growth model, which has had tremendous growth over the years, 9 per cent growth annually, significantly above what average emerging markets have achieved," he said.
Srinivasan also highlighted Asia's growing contribution to the global economy, noting that its share of global growth had risen from a quarter in 2000 to two-thirds today. He attributed the increase partly to improvements in policy frameworks, including inflation targeting and fiscal management.
The region is also benefiting from rising demand for AI-related technology and infrastructure. Sonali Jain-Chandra, deputy director of the IMF's Asia and Pacific Department, said the boom was supporting exports and investment across several Asian economies.
"So, on the upside, we see that during the up-cycle, Asia is benefiting disproportionately from the AI boom that's going on. And if you look at Asia, it's not only a select number of countries that benefit from it; there's basically increased demand for exports and investment in several Asian economies," she said.
She cited South Korea's production of advanced chips and Malaysia's role in assembling and packaging technology products as examples of countries benefiting at different stages of the AI supply chain.
Jain-Chandra also pointed to growing investment in data centres in China, India, Indonesia and Japan, alongside demand for intermediate goods used in AI-related technologies.
She said the benefits extended beyond economies directly involved in developing advanced AI systems, with demand spreading across the wider regional supply chain.
