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Prospects Are Still Bouncy

by Alan Chalkley
The trade of Asia, the region with the highest growth in the world, reflects world trade as a whole.
The biggest exporters of many products - raw materials. components or final goods -- are in this region, from tin, rubber and rice to cars and ships. The volume of garments and electronics, dinner plate and ceramic ware, is at the same time very huge.
Asian countries are also very good customers abroad. In 1990, China, Japan. Taiwan. South Korea, Hongkong and Australia will together have imported over US$515 billion worth of goods between them, which show up In other countries' and regions' exports somewhere.
In 1990, the region as a wlxilc probably exported about US$800 billion worth of goods and imported US$700 billion worth. The difference is the value added or net foreign in come.
If average growth rates are calculated on a trade-weighted basis, then the region's exports rose 8 percent this year and its imports rose eight and half percent. Total trade rose a little over 3 percent.
These are excellent figures, especially in view of the many problems which have beset us all today. The calculations are in current prices; if we wring the inflation out of them, we get a real growth rate of 4 percent for total trade for the year, which is good for most years.
Then there is the Iradc in ■'invisibles." all the tourism, transport, banking and professional income. In recent years these have soared, and In some countries account for nearly as much gross and net income as the visible goods, especially when remittances sent home by overseas nationals are added in. These Invisible Incomes are highly profitable: professional overheads, for instance, arc far lower than factory overheads
Judging by airline activity round the world (strongly up), by hotel occupation (still well up despite vast construction of new hotels), banking development (very expansive in Asia, though perhaps not so elsewhere). and the growing volume of cargo carrying, one can estimate that invisible receipts and payments arc certainly as buoyant as visible trade.
The shipping figures are bright. Lloyds Register, the globally accepted authority, reports that In mid-1990 the world’s merchant fleet stood al 423.6 million gross tons, showing a good rise in ship-ping activity in 1989-90. after continuous falls during 1982-88 when owners Junking their old vessels as fast as they could.
The container trade Is especially buoyant. With a 15 percent increase in boxed traffic between Europe and East Africa, container ship opera tors have ordered 132 new vessels — an all-lime record. By the way. 1990 has seen Hongkong tipped from Us perch as the world's busiest box handling port, yielding to old rival Singapore.
Three countries in Asia have recently cut back their Imports : China reduced them sharply to improve her foreign payments balance; the other two were Australia and Taiwan, but only to a small extent Among the-leadlng exporters, only Indonesia reduced her exports (mainly of oil. but with the Middle East crisis, her income will rise again.)
Wc thus enter 1991 with a big momentum of trade, enough to out-ride any but the most catastrophic of storms. But there are pessimistic quarters which, concentrating on one threatening trend or another, should get a hearing on this.
First, an optimist. The World Bank produces figures showing that East Asia entered the 1990s with an average real growth of 6.7 percent a year during the 1980s. and that record bounce is unlikely to brake sharply, as it pushes and pulls international trade into the new decade.
What of South Asia? This is usually perceived as a region of poverty and low growth -- but In recent years there has been a remarkable U-turn Into growth, averaging 3.2 percent during the 1980s. According to the Bank's long-term forecasts East Asia will gel a 5. 1 percent average real growth Sir the rest of this century. South Asia will get 3.2 percent. This scenario implies an inevitable boost for foreign trade.
There is little consensus among international bodies, however. The UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) warns that "the world economy seems to be slipping into recession" and that only Asia and parts of Europe will continue to grow.
But it wrote Its opinion last * August, under the shadow of *the Iraq-Kuwait crisis. In Its clouds, there was one silver lining - - It did acknowledge that world trade was still strong, and growing faster than total world output. In fact
One of the big shadows over world trade prospects as 1990 ended was the angry conflict between the US and the European Community at the talks on a new General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GAT'D Consensus on form subsidies, textile and footwear barriers, banking services and intellectual property has been fragile at best. The farm and textile shut-outs are the longest-last ing and most widespread obstacles to freer trade.
But the more liberal quarters at the talks were not completely downcast. "Free trading will break through bit by bit. There are many ways to avoid these barriers." Is ihul countrise which limit trade "shoot themselves In the fool ‘ No better examples of • In* can be seen than the collapse of the "centrally planned economies" of Eastern Europe, and the brilliant successes of the open trading economies of the five Asian 'dragon economies '
The growing expansion of multinational manufacturer*.-transporters and hotel managements also breaks down national boundaries, freeing the movements of men and money.
The Asian Development Bank takes a very cautious view of the region s outlook, mainly because It expects higher oil prices to worsen the foreign payments balances of most countries (only China. India. Indonesia and Malaysia are significant producers of crude oil). But the ADB Is always notably careful about Its forecasts, and It may have over-emphasised the effects of the Middle East crisis
On balance, there Is more going for Asian trade in 1991 and afterwards than there is going against It. , And as for those fears for recession In the West. It should be now realised that the American and the European share of world trade has fallen in recent year*. A sneeze In New York may make us say. “Sorry, fella take an aspirin."
But it no longer gives us the influenza. — Depthnews Aaia
What these quarters believe