Economic Cooperation and Regional Integration in the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS)

Following a brief survey of the various economic cooperation programs and initiatives in which countries of the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) - particularly Cambodia, Lao People's Democratic Republic, Myanmar and Vietnam (CLMV) - are engaged, this paper examines the extent to which GMS economies have coveraged and become integrated, among themselves but also with other ASEAN countries. Preliminary evidence of stakeholders' involvement in selected subregional cooperation initiatives in also presented. Although all GMS countries have experienced rapid growth over the past 15 years, no evidence is found that participation of CLMV in subregional cooperation and integration initiatives has led to a narrowing of the gap between the least and most developed GMS and ASEAN countries. While significant progress has been made in reducing poverty, within-country inequality also increased during that period. In addition, while intra-GMS and intra-ASEAN trade both increased, trade of Cambodia and Lao PDR with other GMS or ASEAN countries remain small. If the various subregional cooperation frameworks are to significantly reduce the development gap among members, activities more directly aimed at this objective may need to be emphasized. Re-thinking institutional arrangements for regional cooperation at both the national and subregional/regional levels may be considered in order to facilitate participation of a more representative set of stakeholders in the prioritization of activities and to ensure synergies between the various initiatives can be captured.