"Cities are supposed to be the engines driving India's economic growth. But chronic problems like crumbling infrastructure, deficient governance and urban poverty have been allowed to fester by successive governments, pulling back the vast potential. Even though India has the second largest urban system in the world, with 310 million people and 5,161 cities and towns, urbanization is characterized by widespread poverty, poor urban infrastructure and environmental degradation. The share of the urban population is expected to reach 40% by 2021.

Poorly managed cities continue to lag on both reforms and investment. Implementation of sanctioned projects moves at a snail's pace on the ground. Along with building infrastructure, the government must also improve quality of life in cities. Services like education, healthcare, safe drinking water supply, sanitation and social security are inadequately provided to the urban poor."

"The last couple of boom decades had done a lot to decrease poverty in Asia -- since 1990, the percentage of the population living on a dollar a day had decreased from 55 percent, to less than 10 percent. That means that the number of desperately poor went from nearly 900 million, to fewer than 200. This is largely off the back of China's rise. But poverty estimates are rising much faster than officials thought they would.

About 53 million fewer people in Asia are expected to rise out of poverty than before the crisis began. And there will be an even more significant future knock-on effect, because lots of those people will pull their children out of school, or not feed their families adequately. There are also danger factors now that didn't exist during, say, the Asian financial crisis. Back then, lots of extremely poor city dwellers simply moved back to their rural homelands, living off the land until jobs returned. Now, thanks to massive Asian urbanization, that's harder to do."

"Vietnam's Prime Minister Dung promised Thursday to push economic reforms and invited more foreign investment as Hanoi tries to limit the global slump's impact. He urged regional nations to continue coordinating their economic stimulus measures and boost trade and investment to maintain regional strength.

Dung added that Vietnam would continue to restructure its economy, promote infrastructure programs, push for administrative reforms, and put more emphasis on environmental protection. Vietnam enjoyed 3.1 percent growth in the first quarter and expects five percent growth this year despite the global crisis."

"The health situation in the nation's rural areas is quite perilous. It is compounded by the widespread incidence of poverty and superstitious beliefs among rural dwellers. Rather than seek medical aid from qualified medical personnel even where they are available, most rural dwellers prefer to patronize herbal practitioners who rely essentially on trial and error to diagnose patients. Women and children who form the majority in rural areas are more affected by the situation.

It is a sad fact that most villages lack electricity, potable water, good roads, standard schools and modern communication facilities, among others. This is the area where the government takes the greater brunt of rural to urban migration. It is the duty of government to develop every part of the country so that people would be attracted to live and work in the rural areas with relative comfort. Although the government has a significant role to play in making rural areas attractive to medical personnel, doctors too must recognize that the medical profession requires a huge amount of commitment and sacrifice from practitioners."

"Japan and the World Bank are considering establishing a disaster insurance system for Pacific island countries that would allow them to receive immediate liquidity if hit by a devastating earthquake or tsunami, government sources said Thursday. Prime Minister Aso will explain the initiative at a two-day summit of Pacific island countries beginning Friday in Hokkaido. Japan is hoping to establish the regional insurance program within one or two years with countries participating in the summit and international organizations.

The insurance system will likely be operated by initial funding of between 3 billion and 5 billion yen from donors and annual premiums to be paid by Pacific island countries, including Fiji, Micronesia, Samoa, Tonga and Tuvalu. The system is aimed at supporting Pacific island countries, which have limited infrastructure and budgetary capacities, by quickly providing emergency relief and early rehabilitation in the event of natural disasters."

"Singapore's economy contracted by 14.6 percent in the first quarter of this year over the previous quarter and by 10.1 percent over the first three months of last year, the Ministry of Trade and Industry said Thursday. The manufacturing industry continued its slump in the first quarter, contracting 26.6 percent, or almost a third, on a quarter-on-quarter basis, worse than the 21.3 percent drop in the last quarter of 2008.

Except for the construction and financial services industry, all sectors of the economy continued to languish. On a positive note, the government said the sharp collapse in global trade in late 2008 and early 2009 had tapered off. While trade is still expected to be weak for the rest of 2009, further declines of the magnitude seen earlier this year seem unlikely."

"The rice fields that blanketed the remote mountain village of Chaleunsouks in northern Laos are gone. In their place rise neat rows of young rubber trees -- their sap destined for China. As Beijing scrambles to feed its galloping economy, it has already scoured the world for mining and logging concessions. Now it is turning to crops to feed its people and industries. Chinese enterprises are snapping up vast tracts of land abroad and forging contract farming deals.

Farmers can hope to take home up to $1,200 from an acre of rubber -- roughly seven times more than from growing rice. Many independent farmers embrace the Chinese with enthusiasm, hoping to replicate an earlier rubber bonanza in China's neighboring Yunnan province. But it will be six to seven more years before latex begins to ooze from most trees in the north."

"Numerous reports have named Southeast Asia as one of the world's most vulnerable regions to climate change. Most countries are home to mega-cities and coastal areas with high population density, rely heavily on agriculture, and have limited ability to adapt to weather-related disasters.

A new map launched this month in Indonesia by the Economy and Environment Program for Southeast Asia aims to go one better than many on this issue by breaking vulnerability down into district and provincial levels. Landlocked Laos and its neighbor Cambodia, for example, have a relatively low exposure to climate hazards but figure among the most vulnerable countries because they have such a low capacity to adapt."

"The Philippines ranked lower in terms of global competitiveness this year and still lagged behind its Asian peers, according to the latest World Competitiveness Yearbook. The Philippines ranked 43rd, or two notches down from last year among 57 countries. The competitiveness criteria included economic performance, government efficiency, business efficiency and infrastructure.

While the country has proved that its economy is one of the most resilient in the world, it continues to suffer from low per capita income, increasing the poverty base and lowering middle class participation. The Philippines trailed Malaysia, which placed 18th; Thailand, 26th; Korea, 27th; and Indonesia, with a dramatic change from 51st to 42nd."

"Bangladesh has provisionally decided to link Bangladesh to 27 countries through the proposed Asian Highway network. The proposal will be sent to the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) of the United Nations on approval by the cabinet. The work will be mainly renovating the existing roads and the money will come from the joint funds of ESCAP and Bangladesh.

The communications ministry has selected three routes -- AH 1, AH 2 and regional route AH 41. Japan, Korea, India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Nepal, the Philippines, China, Afghanistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Cambodia, Bhutan, Georgia, Iran, Kazakhstan, Laos and Malaysia are among the countries Bangladesh is going to be connected with."

"Vietnam's economic performance in the first quarter of this year suggests the country's short-term risks are indeed on the downside. The GDP growth rate was 3.1% in the first quarter -- the slowest pace in at least a decade. Unemployment rates are likely double from 4.7% in 2008 to 8.2% for this year (not including the informal sector).

This is not helped by the fact that Vietnam's equitization rate is reversing. According to the Ministry of Finance, the number of SOEs equitized decreased from 724 in 2005 to 73 in 2008. In the government's first stimulus package, about 75% was reserved to SOEs, 20% for SMEs, and 5% for housing projects for low-income earners. This is despite the known inefficiency of SOEs, which do not create employment for the country. The second stimulus package underway will also largely benefit SOEs and do little to address unemployment rates."

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