What is it about?
In this paper we have compared the three largest developing countries in Asia (China, India, and Indonesia) with regard to how they developed and provided infrastructure in the past two decades (about 1995-2015) to find out where they share a similar history and where they clearly differ from each other. We looked at network infrastructure, which includes energy, transport, water, and telecommunications. We first compare the economic development and relevant indicators for macroeconomic aspects, infrastructure investment, and private-sector participation in infrastructure. Then we discuss how the three countries' planning regimes (systems, procedures, regulations, politics) have impacted on how they developed infrastructure. And we then take these lessons to outline the future challenges the three countries are facing - again describing similarities and country-specific differences. We finish the paper by putting this discussion in context of the international development agenda with the Sustainable Development Goals and outline policy recommendations that can guide effective infrastructure provision in other countries.
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Why is it important?
Hundreds of millions of people in Asia still lack access to basic infrastructure in terms of energy, transport, water, and telecommunications, as well as housing and social services. The speed of growth in Asian cities puts high demands on infrastructure supply and maintenance. There is much to learn from countries' past experiences in infrastructure provision. Particularly China, India, and Indonesia are of interest, because of their geographic size, their large populations, and their very different experiences and development performances in providing infrastructure.
Perspectives
What is different about this paper is that we pull together a development economics analysis (based on quantitative analysis of time-series data) and a social science perspective on planning systems, institutional arrangements, and political features impacting on infrastructure provision (qualitative approach) in China, India, and Indonesia. This bridges different disciplines and provides a more comprehensive story about the three countries' infrastructure development.
Mr Renard Teipelke
Asian Development Bank
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Infrastructure provision in developing Asia’s giants: A comparative perspective on China, India, and Indonesia, Journal of Infrastructure Policy and Development, March 2017, EnPress Publisher,
DOI: 10.24294/jipd.v1i1.7.
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