Asia

Export growth in China to continue

According to Chinese economists, the country's foreign trade will continue to grow this year following the steady monthly rises since the latter half of last year.

Their forecast is partly supported by the brisk transactions at the 87th Chinese Export commodities Fair, which ended recently in Guangzhou, capital of Guangdong Province.

China to open treasury bond market

China will allow foreign investors to buy and sell its treasury bonds, the Shanghai Daily reported recently.

Xia Zhuihua, deputy director of the State Debts and Finance Department under the ministry of finance make the remarks at the China financial Industry Reform International Summit in 2000, the paper said.

China will open its treasury bond market by allowing some foreign financial institutions to underwrite bonds,, the paper reported.

Xia added that opening the market will take time, depending on the government's economic progress and the maturity of the market, the report said.

The ministry of finance selected a group of Chinese financial institutions as underwriters of treasury bonds at the beginning of the year, the paper reported.

Japan upgrades economic assessment

The Bank of Japan upgraded its core economic assessment in its May report, but sluggish private consumption blocked the central bank from declaring a full recovery.

"The improvement in Japan's economy is becoming distinct", the central bank said in the monthly report. "Recovery has been observed in some areas of private demand, with business fixed investment continuing to increase gradually.

"Industrial production is increasing and corporate profits and sentiment continue to improve," it said.

But the bank warned that consumer spending, which accounts for some 60 percent of gross domestic product, remained stagnant.

"Housing investment is on a moderate declining trend, and recovery in private consumption continues to be weak through lack of notable improvements in employment and income conditions".

Since February last year, the Bank of Japan has been pushing down short-term interest rates close to zero to hold off deflation in Japan's depressed economy.

In the report, the bank noted waning deflationary pressure in the wholesale price index (WPI) as commodity prices pick up.

"Domestic wholesale prices are somewhat strong mainly due to the rise in petroleum and chemical product prices reflecting an increase in crude oil prices", the central bank said.

In its April report, the bank said the domestic wholesale price index was "flat".

It added in its latest assessment that price pressure was likely to build up from a gradual improvement in domestic demand.

Japan interested in Chaina's natural gas

China's first project to build a liquefied natural gas (LNG) storage tank complex has lured three syndicates from Japan, the world's biggest market for the product, a newspaper reported recently.

A tender for the 600 million dollar project in southern China's industrial region will also draw such world oil majors as Royal Dutch/Shell Group, Exxon-Mobil Corp. and Total Fina Elf of France, the Nihon Keizai Shimbun said. The Japanese Syndicates each involve a gas power utility and a major trading house, the leading economic daily said.

S. Korea posts 13% GDP growth

South Korea's economy grew an estimated 13 percent year on year in the first quarter this year but the government has no plan to raise interest rates to curb inflation, a senior official said.

"The first quarter macroeconomic indicators are quite favourable," top presidential advisor for economic affairs, Lee Ki Ho, told a group of chief executives.

He said the Gross Domestic Product, the total added value of goods and services produced in the country, grew by a whopping 13 percent year-on-year in the first three months to March.

The current account surplus for the same period reached 1.3 billion dollars while the year on year inflation rate was one percent in the same period.

Philippine inflation rises to 3.7%

Inflation in the Philippines rose to 3.7 percent on year in April, the highest level so far this year but considerably below analysts' expectations of about 4 percent.

Prices rose in nearly all categories, the government statistics office said. However, a relatively small increase in food offset sharp rises in fuel prices and cost of services.

Inflation in March was 3.3 percent, and the average for the first four months of the year was 3.2 percent.

Largest Australian project in Vietnam

Tens of thousands of Vietnamese braved a tropical downpour to witness the opening of the biggest infrastructure project ever funded by Australian aid.

Queues of pedestrians, pushbikes, motorbikes and minibuses stretched for miles across the Mekong delta waiting to use the new 1.5 kilometre (one mile) My Thuan bridge across the world's 10th longest river which is designed to transform their lives.

The vast blue cabled suspension bridge, likened to the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) bridge across Sydney harbour, was actually handed over by the Australian engineers recently, but the Vietnamese authorities barred people from using it before its official inauguration.

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