"Poverty levels are usually directly correlated to education levels, but the Ta Cu Ty village in Viet Nam is trying to break that trend. The commune proudly sends over 300 students to school every day. The group of two-story school buildings includes a kindergarten and primary and junior secondary schools, enough to give the students a full-time education. A semi-boarding kindergarten also gives the parents more time to do their farming.

The local administrators and the school board get parents to bring their children to school by making it a strict regulation, which so far has proven effective in drawing children in. The administration has made it mandatory for each household to contribute annually 10kg of rice to feed the boarding school students. Parents who donft send their children to school are fined by confiscating an additional 2kg of rice for the school's food fund."

"The total capital investment in the Philippines has been stagnant since 2002, with the annual investment growth rate averaging zero in 2002-2006. In contrast, Asean neighbors were averaging annual investment growth rates of 3 to 20 percent. Not surprisingly, job creation in the Philippines has remained relatively low in the face of supposedly rapid growth, with 2.7 million unemployed Filipinos as of January 2008.

High unemployment, in turn, translates to high rates of poverty, which recent government data shows to have worsened since 2003. Efforts at raising investment and job creation in the near term must, therefore, focus prominently on industries that could readily employ large numbers of young and relatively undereducated workers. And because 70 percent of the Philippine poor live in the countryside, logical targets would be agriculture, agri-business and rural nonfarm enterprises."

"Plans by the Jakarta city administration to drastically increase groundwater fees is seen as an early step toward better management of water resources. But this measure alone is not enough. The planned hike will increase the current groundwater fees by up to 600 percent. Groundwater is the only ready-to-use water source for Jakartans. Other potentially huge resources -- the 13 rivers crisscrossing the capital -- can hardly be used, as their heavy pollution leads to high treatment costs.

Overexploitation of groundwater has in turn sparked further water scarcity. The poor are hit hardest, having to spend more to buy water when the groundwater runs out. Jakarta needs to look more closely at the possibilities for creating more sustainable water resources."

"In the federal and provincial budgets in Pakistan in 2005-06, $2.01 billion was allocated to education whereas $2.398 billion was set aside for defense. This wide gap reflects the government's priorities. But the allocation of money is not the only problem. In various five-year plan periods 50 percent of allocated funds remained unspent. One major reason was the bureaucratic process for the release of the funds.

Pakistan is still facing the problem of access in education. A large number of students cannot get to schools either because there are no schools available or because they cannot afford to go to school. It is estimated that out of a total 19.22 million primary school age (5-9) children, only 13.72 million are in school and 5.5 million are left out who are never enrolled."

"The rice price in Thailand has more than tripled since the beginning of the year. This week, the export price of Thai rice topped $1,000 per metric ton -- the highest since the early 1970s during the OPEC oil squeeze. But Thai rice farmers do not seem to be benefiting from the increased prices as they have to sell their grain immediately after harvest because of a lack of storage facilities.

World stocks of grain are at their lowest for more than 20 years. The availability of rice on the international market has been further exacerbated by the decision of many of the world's leading rice exporting countries to limit sales or ban them altogether."

"Faced with lack of human resources, poorly maintained ports and a shortage of domestic shipping services, the Pacific region is finding it more difficult to compete with international shipping standards. It has been suggested that Pacific Island countries pool their resources and expertise as a solution.

Shipping services to the region are expensive and thus have an effect on the cost of goods which in turn affect the economic welfare of Pacific communities. Ensuring provision of adequate, efficient and reliable domestic shipping services is one of the most difficult and perplexing challenges facing Pacific countries."

"Farmlands that used to be devoted to rice production are contributing less and less to the foodbasket in the Philippines. The yield today of 2.5 tons per hectare is the lowest in Asia. Thousands of hectares of farmlands have been chopped up into parcels too small to deliver economies of scale. Investments in Philippine agriculture are the lowest in the Asean region.

While farmers in the rest of Asia are modernizing their methods and improving their yields, Filipino farmers have gone back to using water buffalos; we are back to where we were 200 years ago. In the 1960s, the irrigation system was hailed as one of the best in the world, yet by 2001, it had deteriorated badly due to corruption and the lack of a maintenance budget."

"To optimize Indonesia''s crude oil production, the government will activate 5,000 aging fields. There are more than 13,000 aging fields in the country, 5,000 of which could produce 5,000 to 12,000 barrels per day. The regulation was issued to help the country meet its crude oil lifting target after years of failure.

Increased production is hoped to leverage the country's oil export capacity amid soaring oil prices. The new regulation defines aging fields as crude oil fields drilled before 1970 and then left by contractors who had signed cooperating deals."

"Businesses in Viet Nam have been complaining that the regular power cuts have been damaging their production and business plans, causing major financial losses. The dry season has just started, but wide-range electricity cuts are already occurring in Hanoi and HCM City.

Businesses in HCM City complain that the city's electricity company always cuts power on Saturdays and Sundays. They say that they lose 5% of turnover for every hour of electricity cut, if the cut is announced in advance, while the damage may reach 10-15% of turnover for every hour, if the city's electricity company cuts power unexpectedly."

"Government-run outlets selling subsidized rice and other basic commodities are being besieged by members of the middle class in Bangladesh as food prices continue to rise. In Dhaka people are lining up for hours a day in the midday sun to buy 5kg of rice per head under the government's Open Market Sale scheme.

Rice and other commodities in these outlets are almost 30 percent cheaper than the market rate. Other food essentials, including pulses, flour, oil, onions and sugar are also rising after remaining relatively stable for the last two weeks, increasing by nearly 50 percent in the last six months, with the prices of chickens, eggs and fish also going up."

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