Forget the BRICs. Meet seven unheralded countries to watch.
The excitement that drove the discovery of "emerging markets" in the 1980s and the easy money that turbocharged growth during the booming 2000s are over. The most hyped countries -- Brazil, Russia, India, and China -- are all slowing sharply, taking the average growth rate in the developing world back to the old normal of about 5 percent. Today's global economy is all about moderate, uneven growth, with stars emerging in previously underappreciated nations. Forget about the BRICs -- these seven countries are the real breakout nations to watch:Previously:
1. Philippines: This country's huge wealth in natural resources is still largely untapped, and its long stagnant per capita income is still less than $3,000 -- but that means it has lots of room to grow. Since his election in 2010, President Benigno "Noynoy" Aquino has worked to finally deliver his political dynasty's promise to restore the luster of the Philippines of half a century ago, when it was billed as the next East Asian tiger. Aquino has overseen economic reforms that have made government spending more transparent and pushed for more tax revenue. And thanks to success in the outsourcing industry, the Philippine economy has watched incomes grow and new wealth spread.
2. Turkey: The next two members of the club of trillion-dollar economies will be large Muslim democracies -- Indonesia and Turkey. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has brought to his country both economic orthodoxy, taming the hyperinflation that raged when he took office in 2003, and normalcy, opening up opportunities for pious Muslims who had been shut out of plum jobs by the previous secular regimes. This was tantamount to welcoming the majority into the commercial mainstream, and Turkey has prospered ever since, riding the success of its surging auto exports and the boom in the financial services sector.
3. Indonesia: Most economies that have thrived mainly by exporting raw materials -- think Brazil and Russia -- have slowed sharply amid the global financial downturn. Indonesia, however, is a commodity-fired economy that has achieved balance: between its export market and its healthy consumer economy, between the national capital and increasingly vibrant provincial generators of growth, and in the form of a leader, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, who understands the basics of economic reform. That makes the country the model example of those Southeast Asian tigers that were defanged in the 1997 financial crisis but are roaring once again today....MORE
July 2010
Beyond BRICS: the CIVETS
January 2011
The New BRICS on the Block: Which Emerging Markets Are Up and Coming?
May 2011
Beyond BRICS: "A CIVETS index: herding cats?"
