The Knowledge to Decide

The ASEAN nations collectively – if considered a nation – would be the seventh largest economy in the world. Their combined Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is about USD2.4 trillion (as of 2015). ASEAN has a consumer base of more than 600 million, an expanding labor force and a rising Ecommerce industry. There is a growing need to streamline industrial inventories and develop an efficient logistics industry to aid increasingly complex supply chains. Will ASEAN’s logistics industry rise to the challenge? The growing wealth of ASEAN economies With rising costs in China, creeping political turbulence around the world and slower global growth, ASEAN is being seen as a haven of tranquillity by investors. ASEAN’s business sphere is not mature, dominated as it is by small and medium-sized enterprises. But the abundance of natural resources and cost-effective skilled labor has lured many companies to carry out manufacturing processes in this region. For instance, Thailand and Indon

The Middle East is sometimes viewed as an economic failure story. But at the Western fringe of that region, a new global economic powerhouse is rising – Turkey, the transcontinental country positioned strategically between Asia and Europe. With a Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of USD786 billion for 2014, the nation opens its doors to investment across multiple sectors. Will Turkey continue to be a safe haven for investment and can it be a springboard into Europe and the Middle East? Turkey’s steady progression The 1980’s marked a turning point in Turkey’s history. The liberalizing reforms by visionary Prime Minister, Turgut Ozal opened up the economy. Even though the latter years were marred by economic disruption, the Kurdish conflict and a banking crisis, Turkey’s economy consolidated its gains after 2002 when the Justice and Development Party (AKP) came into government. The AKP have since made concerted efforts to institute structural reforms, new fiscal policies and macroe