Changing Foreign Direct Investment Dynamics and Policy Responses : White Paper for Japan's G7 Presidency

A new report from the World Bank Group focuses on the trends in foreign direct investment (FDI), which encompasses foreign investment in new or existing firms and production facilities. FDI is a subset of overall capital flows, but it is perhaps the most critical because of its potential development impact and stability relative to other cross-border capital flows. Foreign capital flows to developing countries fell to an estimated USD 662 billion in 2022 from an average of over USD 1 trillion in the decade preceding the COVID-19 pandemic. Declining investment flows to developing markets largely reflect weaker macroeconomic prospects, geopolitical tensions, as well as the lasting impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. The trend is also linked to the ongoing process of shifting global value chains and the transformation of investment in terms of modes of entry, sources, and sectors, among other dimensions. Growing climate change impacts, rising interest rates, and policy changes in advanced countries--such as incentives for green investments and localization of supply chains for key technologies--have also had far-reaching implications for the allocation of investment across the globe. The study seeks to provide a granular analysis of shifts in foreign direct investment flows and policy trends and suggests responses that developing countries may consider in order to reverse recent declines and to enable more private capital to support their development needs