This paper reports on the geographic extension of the Human Development Index from 177 (a several-year plateau in the United Nations Development Programme's HDI) to over 230 economies, including all members and associate members of ESCAP. This increase in geographic coverage makes the HDI more...

Businesses are crucial members of society, in fact, many are also significant social institutions. The decisions they make and the actions they take reverberate throughout society. Society depends on businesses in their provision of jobs, investment, goods and services produced, and development...

This paper focuses on a key dynamic that is changing the business environment: the globalization of production, which has major implications for the growth prospects of SMEs in Asia and the Pacific. The current global economic environment is characterized by trade liberalization, rapidly...

This studies is the outcome of the project of the Regional Expert Group Meeting on Trade and Transport Facilitation for Export Competitiveness.

The Asia-Pacific region has made a vigorous comeback from the global economic crisis and is currently leading world economic growth. However, not all countries have benefited equally from this rebound. Furthermore, as the second decade of the twenty-first century proceeds, the region faces...

The coverage of trade facilitation is found to have become very extensive, with the details of provisions in some agreements matching that in the draft WTO agreement on trade facilitation. Trade facilitation provisions and principles are increasingly seen to apply not only to Customs procedures...

This publication brings together the main research outputs delivered under a common theme "Regional trade agreements and international production networks" of the Asia-Pacific Research and Training Network on Trade (ARTNeT) research programme, Phase II (2008-2010). The study was divided into...

The Asia-Pacific region has made a vigorous comeback from the global economic crisis and is currently leading world economic growth. However, not all countries have benefited equally from this rebound. Furthermore, as the second decade of the twenty-first century proceeds, the region faces...

While the IPN phenomenon has accelerated trade and investment linkages between countries in East and South-East Asia, the remainder of the region has not matched those countries in this process. The objective of this study is to explore the reasons for this by using India’s performance in the...