ADBI has continued to work with you: Six months on from the Great East Japan Earthquake

TOKYO (11 September 2011) - Six months have passed since Friday 11 March 2011, when the triple disaster of the Great East Japan Earthquake, the tsunami, and the Fukushima nuclear accident struck the Sanriku and Tohoku part of Japan. It was the strongest earthquake in Japan's recorded history and one of the most powerful ever recorded. The tsunami it generated caused extensive loss of life and property damage in northeastern Japan, including at the Fukushima–Daiichi nuclear power plant.

The Great East Japan Earthquake has had, and will continue to have, significant impacts, not just on Japan but also on other economies. The effects of the disasters and their aftermath are not simply economic—such as the disruptions of Japanese and Asian supply chains—but much wider, including on nuclear energy and disaster risk management policies across the region and globe.

As a research think tank located in Tokyo, ADBI is in a unique position to analyze these new challenges. It will conduct studies of the economic and other implications of Japan's triple disaster and has been posting the most incisive analyses by other parties on its website.

As we reported on 14 March, ADBI opened as usual the Monday after the earthquake and resumed its operations of putting on conferences, seminars, and other activities of research, capacity building and training, and outreach. Indeed, Robert N. McCauley of the Bank for International Settlements visited Tokyo and gave a seminar at ADBI only four days after the earthquake. However, several other events planned to be held in Tokyo had to be postponed or cancelled because of the requests made by overseas participants to postpone or cancel them. Those events that had been scheduled to be held abroad were unaffected and proceeded as planned.

By early April, ADBI had adjusted to the new normal life in Tokyo, where staff commuting and mission travel have become less convenient because of less frequent train schedules, where fewer elevators and escalators have been operating, and where buildings, facilities and streets have become darker particularly at night—all because of the need to conserve electricity. Thanks to these and other collective energy conservation efforts by the Japanese people, we have been able to continue our work effectively throughout the spring and the hot and humid summer.

I would like to provide some highlights from what we have done over these past six months.

First, the ADBI Advisory Council meeting, which had been scheduled to be held at the ADBI premises in Tokyo on 22 April, was relocated to Hong Kong, China on the same day. This was the first time the Advisory Council met in a venue other than the ADBI premises or ADB Headquarters.

Second, we have made steady progress on our flagship study on Climate Change and Green Asia, and other major studies, including Role of Key Emerging Economies (ASEAN, the PRC, and India), ASEAN 2030, Pacific Islands 2030, and the International Monetary and Financial System. We have continued to publish working papers at a very steady rate over the difficult six-month period—indeed, more than half of the total published in 2010—and ADBI is on track to match or better the number of working papers published in 2010. We have also published three books in this period, namely Asia and Policymaking for the Global Economy (Brookings Institution Press); Financial Market Regulation and Reforms in Emerging Markets (Brookings Institution Press); The Global Financial Crisis, Future of the Dollar, and the Choice for Asia (ADBI). Highlights booklets were produced for the first two book titles.

Third, the Research Department had planned numerous events for 2011, but as most of them were scheduled to be held outside of Japan, the disasters have had only a limited impact on its activities. Four conferences that had been scheduled to be held at ADBI in Tokyo between 29 March and 21 April were postponed. These are: Financial Sector Regulations and Reforms in Emerging Markets: Final Conference (moved to 30 September 2011); New Thinking in Social Security in Asia (to 17 November 2011); Economic Opportunities for the Ageing Society (to 18 November 2011); and the Roundtable on Capital Market Reform in Asia (to 7-8 February 2012). The policy dialogue on Working Together for Green Asia (21 April 2011) was moved to Hong Kong, China. A Distinguished Speaker Seminar scheduled for 25 March 2011 was cancelled. All Research Department events that had been originally planned to be held outside of Japan were pushed through as scheduled. Overall, between 11 March and 11 September, the Research Department conducted a total of 30 conferences or workshops, 4 distinguished speaker seminars, and 4 other seminars.

ADBI's Major Events Held in Tokyo during 11 March – 11 September 2011

Research events

• Distinguished Speaker Seminar by Sir John Gieve (April)
• ADB-ADBI Joint Seminar on the Asian Development Outlook 2011 (April)
• Distinguished Speaker Seminar by Dr. Yu Yongding (June)
• NBER Japan Project Meeting (June)
• Conference on Asia's Productivity Growth (July)
• Distinguished Speaker Seminar by Secretary General Surin Pitsuwan (August)
• Distinguished Speaker Seminar by Professor Koichi Hamada (August)

Capacity Building and Training (CBT) events

• Asia Pacific Financial Inclusion Forum: Expanding Financial Access through Regional Public-Private Cooperation (September)

Fourth, the Capacity Building and Training (CBT) Department had planned fourteen events for the period between 11 March and 11 September. The disasters had even more limited impacts on CBT activities as twelve of them were scheduled outside of Tokyo. Only one event, jointly organized with the Research Department and originally scheduled to be held in Tokyo on 17 March—the Roundtable on Capital Market Reform in Asia—has been rescheduled to February 2012. Of the remaining thirteen events conducted, one was held in Tokyo and twelve were held outside Tokyo—in cities like Bangkok, Beijing, Manila, Melbourne, and Urumqi.

Finally, as part of Outreach activities, three books were launched in Hong Kong, China and Washington, DC between March and June. These were: Managing Capital Flows: The Search for a Framework (Hong Kong, China); Asia and Policymaking for the Global Economy (Washington, DC); and Financial Market Regulation and Reforms in Emerging Markets (Washington, DC). Another ADBI book, jointly produced with ADB Headquarters, Infrastructure for a Seamless Asia, was translated into Chinese and a few more titles are being translated into Chinese and several other languages of the region.

Over twenty book titles are currently in various stages of production, and most of these have a chance of being published before the end of 2012. Recently ADBI has also been preparing the launch of a blog, called "Asia Pathways," designed to cover critical development and economic issues in the Asia and Pacific region in a lively and thought-provoking way. In a series of linked blog posts, it will provide a platform for original thinking that will eventually permeate the policymaking environment. The blog will be launched by the end of 2011.

As described above, even though some of ADBI's major events that had been planned in Tokyo during March–April were affected, we are now fully in motion to move ahead. Two new senior staff are joining the management team from the Republic of Korea and the People's Republic of China and the ADBI's first results framework for research, CBT, and outreach activities is in the process of being developed.

ADBI will continue to endeavor to become the leading knowledge center in Asia and the Pacific, and to fulfill its objectives of identifying effective development strategies and improving the capacity for sound management in developing member countries through our research and CBT activities. This can be done only in collaboration with you and all other stakeholders. I very much look forward to continuing to work with you all.