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印度今年的經濟成長為6%左右，在中國兩位數的成長耀眼的光茫下顯得暗淡。但是在全球經濟衰退與金融風暴的背景下實屬難得。值得注意的是：在印度的經濟增長中，政府刺激占的比重很小，而資產水準和基礎設施投資卻能與中國相媲美。另外，印度的國內需求遠比中國旺盛，也沒有重商主義的思維，只想增加出口給全球經濟增加貿易不平衡。事實上印度進口多於出口，創造更多的需求。印度長期的成長性甚至優於中國。

中國今年近兩位數增長主要是由政府或公營事業單位的大量支出所支撐的計畫經濟。至於政府或公營事業單位是否能持續花這麼多錢，是否有這莫多錢償還，這似乎是中國經濟最大的隱憂。一但這公共支出減少，經濟不穩定因素就會引發問題：大量的貿易順差，長期被低估的匯率、及大量外匯準備等等，這些都可能會進一步造成世界經濟問題。

印度目前是全球第二大國外直接投資目的地國家，僅次於中國，而這些投資大多數來自亞洲。2007年，外來投資總額達230億美元，較前一年成長了40%。雖然2008-09年度300億美元外來投資的目標難以達成，但無視全球經濟衰退，資金仍流入印度。

此外，印度正在努力追趕中國。2000年印度外國投資總額只是中國總額的百分之幾，而如今卻達到了25%。大部分增量來自東亞地區。印度已經超過中國成為日本對外投資最多的國家，而且根據調查，印度在未來十年內將成為日本長期投資的首選。印度和日本的經濟與安全關係日益增強。日本政府的對外援助30%給了印度，並允諾投資德里—孟買工業走廊40億美元。

但是印度與東亞及東南亞的經濟關係卻不盡裡想。印度IT業，國際外包的明星產業，卻在日韓吃了閉門羹；因為日韓的企業習慣在企業內部處理IT事務。在貿易方面，仍有許多障礙存在。例如：印度的製藥業便對日本這一全球第二大醫藥市場不得其門而入。審計、廣告、紡織、醫療...等等，都有國家拒印度於門外。

最明顯的遺失環節是－－印度很大程度上獨立於東亞和東南亞全球供應鏈之外。一是因為上世紀九十年代印度對外開放之前，東亞及東南亞產業供應鏈已經建立。另一個原因是－－對中國的猜疑，因為中國為供應鏈網路的中心。

中國在東亞的優勢使得印度向東看的政策有了利基：這一政策得到日本、韓國和臺灣的支持，這些國家也在尋求與印度保持更緊密關係。因為印度被視作與中國抗衡的力量。

  Banyan   
Land of Eastern promise       
Nov 19th 2009        
From The Economist print edition     
       
India's membership of Asia remains primarily cartographic       
       
                                       Illustration by M. Morgenstern       
       
  
AN EASY but instructive way to bait an Indian economist is to credit the Chinese economy with coming to Asia’s rescue and arguably the world’s. It is, claims the economist, an example of anti-India bias. Why does India not get equal credit for robust growth? In all the frothy coverage about Asia’s amazing rebound, including in The Economist, where is India? “You’d think”, the economist complains, “that India isn’t even part of Asia.”      

       
To what degree India’s economy is part of a vibrant Asian whole has long been a preoccupation among Indian policymakers. Now the global slowdown has given the debate a keener edge, for it has disproportionately hit the commercial markets in America and Europe to which India traditionally looks. “Look East”, long an avowed tenet of government policy, is in vogue.       

       
There is something to the economist’s complaints. For all the credit that it gets for its recovery, China’s near double-digit show this year is mainly a command-economy extravaganza involving massive state-directed spending. When that show is over, the skew in China’s economy—an undervalued currency, a mercantilist bias in favour of manufactured exports and an obsession with accumulating foreign reserves—remains less the solution to global imbalances than one of the fundamental causes.       

       
By contrast, though India’s annualised growth rate of around 6% this year is below China’s heady levels, it is impressive against a backdrop of global turmoil. What is more, government stimulus plays only a small part in the growth. Levels of capital and infrastructure investment compare favourably with China’s. And, much more than in China, the hot story in India is domestic demand. India is no mercantilist adding to global imbalances. It imports more than it exports, creating much needed global demand. India’s long-run growth will overtake even China’s.       

       
All well and good. But it does not explain how much India is indeed part of Asia. Flows of foreign direct investment (FDI) suggest that the bond is ever tighter. India is now the second-most- popular global destination for FDI, behind only China, and much of this is Asian investment. Total inward investment was $23 billion in 2007 (the latest available figure), up over two-fifths on a year earlier. The target of $30 billion for 2008-09 is unlikely to be met, but inflows into India still defy the global slump.       
       
Moreover, India is playing late catch-up with China, with FDI rising from just a few percent of China’s figure in 2000 to about a quarter today. Much of the increase has come from East Asia. Measured by flows, India is overtaking China as Japan’s biggest destination for foreign investment and, according to a survey by the Japan Bank for International Co-operation, will be the most favoured destination for long-term Japanese investments over the next decade. As for South Korea, consumer-electronics firms are driving a push into India. Cracking the rumbustious market—LG Electronics advertises in a dozen Indian languages—is the kind of offensive that Korea’s shock-troop salesmen relish.       

       
Three years ago the then Japanese government defined a wide “arc of freedom and prosperity”, one end anchored in Japan, that took in India on its path. The new government of the Democratic Party of Japan has dropped the arc in name, but it survives in practice. India and Japan are strengthening economic and security ties. Japan sends 30% of its official aid to India and has promised over $4 billion for a “Delhi-Mumbai industrial corridor”. In South Korea, a finance-ministry bigwig says his urgent priority is to persuade young ministry high-flyers, who invariably apply for an American posting, to go to India instead.      

       
And yet. India’s economic ties with East and South-East Asia fall short. For this columnist flying the free, prosperous arc from Tokyo to Delhi means an 18-hour schlepp via Hong Kong and Bangkok. Direct flights between Delhi and Beijing began only three years ago, and run to only four a week, with the odd supplement provided by Ethiopian Airlines.        
       
And although India is opening some sensitive industries, such as telecoms and retail, to foreign investors, ownership limits remain. The obstacles work both ways. India’s information-technology giants, stars of international outsourcing, bang their heads in Japan and South Korea, where conglomerates’ ingrained habits of managing IT in-house persist. In trade (both goods and services), a welter of impediments persist. For instance, India’s drug companies are shut out of Japan, the world’s second-biggest market for pharmaceuticals. Auditing, advertising, textiles, medicines, you name it: one or other country has objections. Free-trade negotiations between India and Japan have dragged on for years, with no deal in sight.     

  
The missing link       
       
Most glaring of all, India is largely absent from those supply chains in East and South-East Asia that have come to exemplify globalisation itself. Partly that is because by the time India started to open up in the 1990s they were already established. Partly it is because Indian elites have long looked to America and then Europe for their education and business opportunities. But partly it is because of abiding suspicions of China, which happens to lie at the heart of the networks.       

       
Some suspicions are economic. At home, small Indian businesses have lobbied to block the negotiation of a China-India free-trade agreement for fear of Chinese competition. But they are mainly geopolitical. Indeed, China’s preponderance in East Asia seems to provide the rationale for India’s “Look East” policy, and its encouragement by Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, which also seeks closer ties with India. India is welcomed in the region as China’s counterweight. On security grounds, the impetus may be justified. On economic grounds, unless surviving trade impediments are broken down, it makes for pretty lousy policy.        

 http://www.economist.com/world/asia/displaystory.cfm?story_id=14915094

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The story was taken from the website of The Economist.  The copyright remains with The Economist.  The Economist is not involved, nor endorse the production of this blog.