Today Trends

Author: Editorial Board, ANU Leaders of the 21 APEC economies met virtually on Friday and made progress on some of the biggest economic challenges facing the world: climate change and pandemic recovery. There was also agreement to defend the multilateral trading system — the scaffolding that holds together the global economy. The APEC summit chaired by New Zealand came at the end of a busy summit season for leaders on the heels of the Rome G20 meeting and the Glasgow COP26 summit, and before that the East Asia Summit that was hosted virtually by Brunei. Its time in the headlines will be further squeezed by the sudden announcement of a virtual bilateral summit between US President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping on Monday, the first since President Biden took office. It would be easy to dismiss the non-binding economic forum in the Asia Pacific between these major events that command the attention of the world, but that would miss the important and enduring contribution t

Author: Peter Drysdale, ANU The online APEC economic leaders meeting chaired by New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern over the weekend underlines just why APEC still matters. In this year’s APEC agenda New Zealand sought to build agreement on economic and trade policies to strengthen the COVID-19 recovery, increasing its inclusivity and sustainability and enhancing the role of innovation in a digitally enabled recovery. The goals set at the 2020 summit in Malaysia have been given a harder edge with members committing to detailed reviews of progress towards implementation by 2040. There was practical progress on elimination of tariffs and restrictions on trade in COVID medicines, support for a temporary waiver on intellectual property on COVID-19 vaccines and on the digitalization of trade clearance procedures. In the wake of the Glasgow COP26 Summit, major achievements were agreements by the 21 APEC economies for a standstill on fossil fuel subsidies by 2022, on stronger targ

Author: Jingdong Yuan, University of Sydney At its most recent meeting in Tajikistan this September, the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) started a formal process to grant Iran full membership . This will be the second time the organisation expands after accepting India and Pakistan in 2017 — now extending its reach from Central and South Asia to the greater Middle East. Iran’s inclusion in the SCO has important implications for what is largely a Central Asian organisation, even if Iran is the main beneficiary . At a time of international isolation, Tehran hopes that its membership will open up opportunities to expand political, economic and cultural ties with countries across the region. With two SCO members on the United Nations Security Council, Iran hopes it will get a more sympathetic hearing on issues such as sanctions relief. Still, the significance of Iranian membership is, at least for now, more symbolic than substantive. What Iran brings to the SCO really depends

Author: Aneel Salman, COMSATS University Islamabad In 2025, Pakistan may face an acute water crisis . To avoid this outcome, Pakistan must frame a rational, politically unbiased and holistic water policy that reflects its priorities of growth and development. The problem is not due to water availability, but the mismanagement of water resources. In 2021, the government of Pakistan’s Sindh province received 5.38 million acre-feet (MAF) of irrigated water, which is a 35 per cent decline in its share in provincial allocation. Red chilli, cotton and rice crops have suffered the most due to the shortage. The decline in provincial allocation was a political move despite the Pakistan Meteorologist Department claiming that this decrease is due to climate change .  Under the 1960 Indus Waters Treaty between India and Pakistan, Pakistan gave up its control over three eastern tributaries of the Indus River, which is one of the root causes of the water crisis. The total inflow of water

Authors: Shubhankar Kashyap and Anushka Bhattacharya, University of Delhi ASEAN has been vital for achieving cooperation and economic growth in Southeast Asia. But due to the COVID-19 pandemic, health security has become the primary concern shaping its regional aspirations. The human and economic devastation caused by COVID-19 is unparalleled, despite the region experiencing several economic and health crises before. The region’s key sectors, including tourism, retail and manufacturing, took a big hit. Yet ASEAN stepped aside and let its member states combat the virus independently. Southeast Asian states acted without consulting with their neighbours or ASEAN, leading to disparate policies. Given the contagiousness of COVID-19, states needed to communicate information regarding infections and the subsequent policy measures they were taking to combat them to allow neighbouring states to prepare an adjoining response. The timeliness of these responses was key to stopping the virus.

Author: Zhaoyong Zhang, Edith Cowan University The trend of the Chinese renminbi (RMB) rising against the US dollar reached a three-year high in May 2021. This signalled an end to the currency’s depreciation in response to the Trump administration’s trade war with China. Whether the current rally in RMB will be maintained remains a hotly debated topic, especially given the current COVID-19 pandemic-related global economic recovery and the long-term headwinds to China’s growth. China’s sound economic outlook and strong fundamentals have contributed to this trend. With its economy growing by 2.3 per cent in 2020, China was the world’s only major economy to achieve growth despite COVID-19 lockdowns . China is expected to take the lead in the global recovery, with domestic consumer spending rising faster than anticipated. The IMF’s October projection indicates that the Chinese economy will grow by 8 per cent in 2021. Recent data shows China’s exports grew faster than expected thanks to

Author: Corey Wallace, Kanagawa University Throughout 2021, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida downplayed his reputation as a defence dove ahead of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) presidential race. Eventually victorious, the new prime minister — only 26 days into the job — then led his party to a convincing victory in the lower house election. Will this electoral tail wind allow Kishida to push forward on bolder reforms, including defence concerns that were so prominent in the recent LDP contest? Some of the themes debated during the LDP leadership election were unsurprising, such as Japan’s need to better secure its southwest maritime domain and resist Chinese attempts to undermine the status quo around the Senkaku Islands. The candidates also debated legally and militarily enabling Japan’s Self-Defense Forces (SDF) to strike military positions attacking Japan from foreign territories — an increasingly perennial discussion given the rapid pace of missile testing in the

Author: Ida Aju Pradnja Resosudarmo, ANU Indonesia announced the termination of the long-standing Indonesia–Norway Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) partnership. While promising, it was anticipated from the start that the collaboration would not be easy. The timing of the termination on 10 September 2021, just two months before the 26th Conference of the Parties (COP26) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, presents important lessons that environmentalists can reflect on. Indonesia and Norway signed a cooperation agreement on REDD+ in May 2010. REDD+ is an incentive scheme to reward developing countries or entities for reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation. It was supposed to be a new chapter in their bilateral relationship on forests and climate where Norway pledged US$1 billion to assist Indonesia in reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The Letter of Intent (LOI) detailed key actions alongside a timel

Author: Ken Heydon, LSE China’s global value chain (GVC) links with ASEAN are both less dominant and more beneficial than they appear at first sight. But there are major challenges ahead for ASEAN. With ASEAN public opinion seeking more alignment with the United States and less with China , ASEAN’s GVC dependence on China might be seen as a cause for concern. Over the past three decades, ASEAN trade links with the United States, the European Union and Japan have weakened relative to those with China. Moreover, dependence on China has been more in backward linkages (where China’s share of foreign value added exports incorporated in ASEAN exports has risen from 5 per cent to 17 per cent) than in forward links (where China’s share of ASEAN value added exports incorporated in other countries’ exports has risen from 4 per cent to just 12 per cent). But this account needs nuance. ASEAN’s links with the United States, the European Union and Japan are not as weak as they appear. And the

Authors: Hao Tan, University of Newcastle, Elizabeth Thurbon, UNSW, John Mathews and Sung-Young Kim, Macquarie University On 21 September 2021, Chinese President Xi Jinping announced at the UN General Assembly that ‘China will not build new coal-fired power projects abroad’. Despite the lack of detail — such as how the declaration will affect projects at different stages of financing — China’s new position has been widely lauded in the international community. The announcement came as a surprise following China’s recent wrangling on the coal issue with the United States. In early September 2021, US Climate Envoy John Kerry visited China but failed to secure a Chinese declaration for a moratorium on financing international coal-fired projects. China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi explicitly told Kerry that ‘China–US cooperation on climate change cannot be divorced from the overall situation of China–US relations’. How to square these two images, separated by mere weeks? On the surfac