Role of Economic Policies in Achieving MDGs in the Asia-Pacific Region: Challenges, Gaps and Area of Interventions

This paper tries to examine the role of various economic policy measures that are unveiled in the Asia Pacific region to achieve the MDGs. In do so, in the first stage, the paper tries to bring out the extent of achievement of MDGs in the region. Further, it attempts to fix the bench marks for each macro policy variable in relation to MDG achievement. In the second stage, it undertakes the gap analysis to see the extent of distance between ‘on-track’ and ‘off-track’ countries and emphasis prioritisation of policies in the region. The study concludes that Asia Pacific as a whole are close to the bench mark countries in terms of fiscal and trade policies. But there is a lot more that needs to be done in the financial and stabilisation policies. Further, the study concludes that there is a need to emphasis more on the financial and macroeconomic reforms that helps in domestic resource mobilisation and also in the growth process that are necessary for achieving development goals in time.