A panel of experts has advised the Asian Development Bank to switch its
emphasis from supporting economic growth to supporting environmentally
sustainable growth.
In a new paper, the panel says the ADB should also look to move away
from fighting extreme poverty on a country-by-country basis in Asia and
switch to a regional focus.
It says the bank should encourage infrastructure development mainly
through public-private partnerships and support the growth of regional
financial markets. And it recommends that in its focus on energy and
environmental activities it should concentrate mainly on global issues
such as climate change.
The panel said it believed the bank should become more ‘nimble,
flexible and decentralized’, by using technical staff in Asia’s main
business and academic centres.
Haruhiko Kuroda, the bank’s president, gave a positive response to the
suggestions from the panel, which was chaired by Supachai Panitchpakdi,
secretary-general of the United Nations conference on trade and
development. The other members were: Isher Ahluwalia, chairperson of
the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations;
Nobuyuki Idei, Sony’s chief corporate adviser; Caio Koch-Weser,
vice-chairman of Deutsche Bank; Justin Yifu Lin, professor and director
of the China Center for Economic Research at Peking University; and
Lawrence Summers, a professor at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy
School of Government.
