"Mahendranagar is one of the popular gateways to India for Nepali labor. Everyday, at least 25 people go past Tanakpur, and there are numerous such entry points along the 1000 km long border across the east west Nepal-India border. These people who search for opportunities elsewhere live under the poverty line. From an economist's point of view, they can be seen as the saviors of the economy as they send back remittance. According to the population census 2011, the total population is 26.6 million out of which 2 million are absentees.

Remittance has been one of the biggest contributors to the Nepal economy for the last decade, covering over 25 percent of GDP in recent years. Nepal's youths are migrating to India and the rest of the world in search of employment. But to ensure economic expansion, including political stability, Nepal must figure out a way to exploit its hydro-power potential, tourism, and improvement in the agriculture sector. This will, without doubt, create employment opportunities at home."

"It is not everyday that you hear the words Big Pharma, billionaires, philanthropists and eradication of diseases in the same sentence. Well, Monday, January 30th was one such spectacular day. Bill Gates, WHO Director General, leaders of major pharmaceutical companies and senior government officials from around the globe unveiled in London, a joint declaration and a strategy to rid the world of ten neglected diseases that afflict the poorest of the poor in the world within a decade.

While there is little doubt that tremendous progress will be made by the London declaration to detect, diagnose, cure and manage the neglected tropical diseases better, the challenges for a healthy future for the world's poorest are far from over. The challenges in poor regions are compounded by lack of staff that is adequately trained, or prepared, to handle medical devices. The workforce may have been trained decades ago on antiquated instruments and technologies, but there is also a continuous decline in the number of qualified and capable technicians."

"Four privately-owned Myanmar banks will next month open exchange services in Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore in a bid to ease problems with remittances from migrant workers abroad and increase connectivity with ASEAN economies. The move will make life easier for the millions of Myanmar's works living outside the country whose remittances serve as a crucial safety net for families back home. To date, those who send money home have been forced to use unofficial brokers who charge a sizable commission.

A currency crisis in June last year brought remittance services grinding to a halt after a substantial drop in circulation of the Myanmar currency, the kyat, triggered by a strengthening in its value. The move sparked alarm, given the quantity of money flowing into Myanmar from overseas relatives: the World Bank estimated that in 2008 alone, remittances to Myanmar totalled $150 million."

"Chinese farmer Chen Shusheng's biggest worry is his son, whose scholarly glasses, pale skin and slim blue jeans contrast sharply with the older man's thick, dirt-caked hands, uneven teeth and bulky home-made clothes. The family's brand-new, whitewashed home an hour from Beijing is complete with flush toilet but lacks a daughter-in-law -- because the son has been unable to hold down a job. China's new rural generation are no longer peasants tied to their land. But the countryside offers few alternatives, stranding many young people between the old life of manual farming and new world of migrant labor.

Migrants lack access to many city services, in particular health services and schools, creating the danger that their children will become an under-educated underclass. The quasi-official schools that have sprung up for migrant children on the outskirts of towns are expensive, of poorer quality, and shut out of the university exam system. Many children are left to stay with grandparents in the villages, where schools and clinics are far away and poorly equipped."

"Poverty and crime are linked to each other as statistics from Asia's largest jail -- Tihar Prisons -- reveal that 92 percent of the prisoners lodged there are from the lower income strata of society. Of the 12,124 inmates lodged inside Tihar Prisons, the monthly income of 92 percent inmates does not exceed Rs 8,000, according to the data for the year 2011.

Around 75 percent of the prison population comprises of people who earned an annual income below Rs 50,000 at the time of their arrest, according to Sunil Gupta, law officer and spokesperson Tihar Prisons. Around 2,414 inmates lodged there were working as agricultural laborers during their time of arrest and 536 were into farming their own land."

"Two regional strategies can help to prevent a possible China-US power contest in Southeast Asia. First, use hedging strategies with caution. Asean members need to be painstaking in their unilateral hedging strategies against China and make sure that their actions do not create tension that could cause a power contest in the region. Asean members should maximize the range of strategic options to cushion against any unprecedented changes or shocks.

Secondly, Asean should unify its voice on the Indonesian concept of 'dynamic equilibrium', which adheres to the principle of mutual respect and common interest between Asean members and other regional powers. Asean should also pursue a 'soft power' policy to expand its economic and cultural influence beyond the Southeast Asian region. Last year, Indonesian President Yudhoyono evoked the significance of geo-economics, not geo-politics, in the Asia-Pacific region, at the Apec CEO Summit in Honolulu. Asean could present itself as a bellwether to promote the geo-economics approach in Asia and push for its favored choice of establishing an Asean+6 free trade agreement."

"The ASEAN+3 Macroeconomic Research Office was officially opened in Singapore on Tuesday as an independent macroeconomic surveillance unit of the Chiang Mai Initiative Multilateralization (CMIM) Agreement, the Monetary Authority of Singapore said. The Chiang Mai Initiative is a currency swap agreement among the finance ministries and central banks of the ASEAN member states as well as China, Japan and Korea, or ASEAN+3 countries.

Dubbed the Asian monetary fund, the currency swap arrangement draws from a foreign exchange reserve pool worth $120 billion and was launched on March 24, 2010 when the CMIM agreement took effect. The ASEAN+3 Macroeconomic Research Office, or AMRO, is responsible for monitoring the macroeconomic and financial situation of the ASEAN+3 region and the individual economies and identifying emerging vulnerabilities within them."

"Plans for a prototype microinsurance product that combines life protection and savings have been scrapped by the Philippine government. Instead, the German Agency for International Cooperation (GIZ) is designing a life insurance product with simplified features to make it more accessible to the poor. GIZ is currently aiding the Insurance Commission in developing a microinsurance framework and prototype products.

GIZ initially hoped to offer savings accounts, where premiums would be deducted from the account to fund life insurance coverage from critical illness or death. Given the erratic wage patterns of the low-income sector, the savings account would provide a stable pool for the payment of premiums. Moreover, policyholders can still withdraw their money in case of emergencies."

"As Asia emerges as the world's largest wealth region, the one question foremost on the minds of all private bankers should be: what does a typical Asian client look like? One thing is for certain: believing that what has worked for wealthy clients in Europe or the US in the past will work in Asia, too, would be a big mistake. Asia's high net-worth individuals (HNWIs) -- people with $1 million or more in investable assets -- are younger than their western counterparts.

Forty-one percent of Asia-Pacific's HNWIs are 45 or under versus a global average of 17 percent, according to Capgemini and Merrill Lynch. This means they are still creating and growing their wealth, as opposed to western HNWIs who tend to focus more on wealth preservation. Another important difference is that a greater proportion of Asian HNWIs are business owners, mostly first or second generation."

"India's largely government-owned monopoly, Coal India, is changing its pricing system -- and the result will be a staggering 25 percent projected increase in the price of electricity generated with domestic coal. Since imported coal has already tripled in price over the past three years, the reality should be sinking in. An economic development strategy for Asia premised on cheap coal is over.

In spite of $60 billion in recent private investment in coal generating plants, India's coal fleet has operated at less than 50 percent of capacity for the past six months -- many plants squeezing through with only a few days worth of coal reserves at a time. Coal production in India has grown -- but at a snail's pace compared with China. India now produces only 73 percent of its own demand, giving coal exporters like Indonesia and Australia the whip hand and the ability to extract enormous price increases as India competes with other Asian countries seeking to fire their boilers and light their cities."

"Some lakes and ponds in Hanoi have disappeared during urbanization, while many others are getting narrowed, and many of them are seriously polluted. In the early twentieth century, Hanoi had 600-750 ponds and lakes. According to the Hanoi Construction Department, there are now 111 ponds and lakes in Hanoi.

The lakes and ponds in Hanoi play a very important role in regulating water levels and prevent flooding in the capital city. Meanwhile, the lake encroachment by local residents continues. They throw construction waste, earth and rubbish on lakeside areas. Waste water discharges into the lakes, causing thick layers of mud at the bottom, thus reducing the area and the capacity of the lakes."

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