India fastest growing Asian economy
India continues its strong economic performance with Asian Development Bank projecting the highest GDP growth rate of 7.3 per cent in 2018, which was comparatively less in 2017 (6.7 per cent)
‘Export expansion, rising domestic consumption, strong investment fueled by FDI, and a strengthening agriculture sector’ will propel Vietnam’s GDP to 7.1 per cent. The country has seen significant improvement and the growing robust workforce of the country has been instrumental in the country’s growth.
Bhutan, a country that has built its economy on clean energy generation is expected to see a surge in GDP With 7.1 per cent in 2018.
The boost from farm and industrial sector has helped Bangladesh maintain a steady growth with 7 per cent GDP, however the country is projected to see a slight decrease from last year’s growth of 7.3 per cent.
Laos, Philippines and Myanmar share similar growth rate of 6.8 per cent, which is more or less consistent for Laos and Philippines (6.7 per cent in 2017). Myanmar has remained stagnant this year.
China, one of Asia’s economic giants with a growth rate of 6.6 per cent, has fallen behind in 2018 in comparison to 6.9 per cent growth of 2017.
Large account deficits has strangled Pakistan’s growth rate and the projected growth is seen at 5.6 per cent in 2018. It however is a slight improvement on the last year’s growth rate of 5.4 per cent.
Indonesia and Malaysia share the same GDP growth of 5.3 per cent in 2018. Indonesia has progressed above previous year’s GDP of 5.1 per cent whereas Malaysia has gone down the line from 5.9 per cent in 2017.
The toll that floods in Nepal took on the country’s economy is reflected in the country’s projected GDP rate of 4.9 per cent, a significant decrease from 7.4 per cent in 2017.
The GDP of Sri Lanka has significantly grown to 4.2 per cent in 2018 from 3.1 per cent in 2017. However the growth is still subdued owing to the badly hit agriculture sector.
Thailand has a projected growth rate of 4 per cent in contrast to 3.9 per cent of 2017.
Other Asian countries like Mongolia, Singapore, South Korea and Brunei has shown steady decrease in their GDP growth rates in comparison to their growth rates of 2017.
According to the Asian Development bank projections, While the region is expected to meet the forecast of 6.0% growth in 2018, the projection for 2019 has been trimmed by 0.1 percentage points to 5.8%.
