Even on a Lazy Weekend

I guess it will be quite some time before finance people talk about something else.
The Wall Street mess has pretty much set off the alarm for markets to scramble for contingencies. This as the ordinary person is left to wait and see how its ripples will affect one who doesn’t bother with stocks and financial [...]

Impact on a Walled Street

One of the big things I never got to lay a finger on here during my long hiatus is the Wall Street crisis. By now, even those who aren’t into finance, economics or current events would’ve at least heard the ordeal over that side of North America. By now too, a lot of experts would’ve [...]

Where We Are in the Downward Spiral

People would give a lot not to find out what’s in the news already. A break from the nitty gritty of citizenry in this country is the mode nowadays. It’s the only thing that a lot of people, at least those around me everyday as I walk streets, commute and go about as a bare [...]

Which Yardstick?

I first encountered the Asian Development Bank study entitled “Philippines: Critical Development Constraints” over the weekend at Ellen Tordesilla’s blog entry, (thanks to leelock.) Despite the much hyped 7.3% growth in terms of GDP by the Arroyo administration, (which the report acknowledged,) the study notes that “both public and private investment remain sluggish and their [...]

Food for Thought

A recent Time article takes a look at the effect of the rise of food prices worldwide especially among poor nations. Growing demand for food among fast growing economies such as India and China, rising oil prices affecting other agriculture commodities in turn, and global warming affecting harvests because of changes in climate, were among [...]

The Week’s Worth Elsewhere

Plowing Through Plowshares
This view reminds me of a fact my former professor told our class once: Land Reforms and other agricultural programs’ benefits often have the flaw of not actually being felt by the most destitute farmers for whom the endeavors are supposed to be for. That Pakistani viewpoint highlights just how much the centuries-old [...]

A Closer Look at Intellectual Property Rights

Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) can oftentimes be seen in discussions among several spheres of knowledge and domestic and international bodies. In the aftermath of the 1997 Asian Fiscal Crisis for instance, free trade agreements (FTAs) and economic partnership agreements (EPAs) have been characterized by the tight implementation of intellectual properties along with easier market access [...]

Emerging Asia’s Innovation Edge

A business week article of the same title earlier this month focuses on the rapid rate of development of Asia powerhouses China and India. Important points from a report Gartner released days before include:

China is fast becoming the global leader in research. In 2005 as the report mentions, applications for patents in China outnumbered those [...]

A Mix on Structural Reform

An Oxford Analytica article came out last Tuesday on the progress on reform since the 1997-98 financial crisis. It contains an analysis of 4 southeast asian countries, (Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines and Thailand,) on the progress of economic stability and remaining structural vulnerabilities after the debacle that gripped the region.
So goes the significance of the article:
Over [...]

A Look into the Asian Identity

Asia Times had an article last week about the re-emergence of the “‘Asian values’ debate” as “Asia regains its self-confidence and reasserts itself on the international stage.”
The article by Chietigj Bajpaee takes a comprehensive look at the Asian identity’s history taking into account ideological, religious and political perspectives which had the center stage for defining [...]