Japan’s Bank for International Cooperation, the government’s main overseas lender, told Bloomberg it will increase yen loans and investment in clean-energy technology to help cut greenhouse emissions in China and India, Asia’s two economic powerhouses. japan is believed to be the regions greenest country.

Japan, together with the World Bank, the U.S. and the U.K. plans to raise a US$5.5 billion fund to help poor nations develop clean technology. Finding ways to convince developing countries to agree to emissions targets is likely to be a focus of the Group of Eight industrialized nations summit in Japan’s northern island of Hokkaido next week.

“We have to focus on major developing countries, and as a financier we are going to put more and more money into private- sector investment in these countries, not only by lending but also by equity financing,” Takashi Hongo, director-general of environment finance at JBIC, said in Tokyo. Hongo declined to say how much money the bank has set aside for the projects.

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The world is flat when it comes to inflation. As oil exceeded US$139/barrel, in the last week, truckers across Asia and Europe protested. The strikes arrested transportation links that bring food to people, leaving many more in the lurch.

Exerpts from a Reuters report say - In Asia, governments are struggling to prevent rising prices making the burden on the public so heavy that it threatens political stability.

South Korea’s cabinet offered to resign in the face of huge street protests on Tuesday about the policies of its unpopular President Lee Myung-bak.

He said Asia’s fourth-largest economy could be heading into crisis because of surging resource prices and slowing growth. Producer price inflation in the world’s fifth-largest crude oil importer was near a 10-year high last month.

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India’s young politicians met Chinese officials to foster common bonds between the two countries on Monday. Trying to bring about a much needed change in India’s political image in the eyes of the world, the politicians were led by Sachin Pilot, a member of the Lok Sabha (House of the People) of the Indian National Congress. Pilot is heading a delegation of young Indian members of parliament at the invitation of the International Department of the Communist Party of China Central Committee. The delegation met with Hua Jianmin, a senior Chinese legislator in a bid to share broad common interests between China and India, two of the largest developing nations.

“The friendship between China and India is beneficial to both countries and Asia and the world at large” Pilot said. He added that India was ready to work with China to take advantage of parliamentary, political party and non-government exchanges to expand and promote the cooperation in such fields as energy, poverty alleviation, agriculture and infrastructure construction. He told Xinhua he believed the Beijing Olympic Games would be a great success.

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A growing consumer demand in India and China means that citizens will not only be spending their disposable income in shops, but will also be surfing online for the hottest deals. A recently concluded Master card survey said that by 2010, China will reign as the highest online shopping turnover at about US$1.4 trillion while India will clinch the No 2 spot. Both countries are expected to displace japan which currently rules the online market, Thaindian reported.

“The rising population of upper-middle-income urban elites is likely to boost the online shopping markets in China and India significantly. Domestic consumer spending in the two countries is poised to pick up strongly, underpinned by the rapid pace of urbanization, robust economic expansion and rising spending powe,” the China Daily quoted the survey, as saying.

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The economic powerhouses - India, China and Brazil are not just guzzling oil and gulping steel, they are also minting millionaires. The rich are getting richer - the number of millionaires jumped 22.7 percent in India last year, 20.3 percent in China and 19.1 percent in Brazil, according to the 12th annual World Wealth Report, prepared by US investment bank Merrill Lynch and information technology group Capgemini. On the whole, the number of millionaires worldwide rose 6 percent last year to 10.1 million.

The report which highlights the rising clout of emerging market countries on the global financial stage, attributed the increase in such areas to gains in commodity exports, “paired with growing international acceptance of emerging financial centers as significant global players”, AFP reported.

Emerging markets also figured prominently in initial public offerings last year, during which more than 1,300 IPOs raised about 300 billion dollars. Emerging markets captured seven of the top 10 issues, the study said.

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Would you buy a US$1,000 dress if you knew the tag on it said “made in China”? A recent report by the Guardian thinks otherwise. In an article on the increasing influence of Asian shoppers, the Guardian says - Asian shoppers are particularly origin-conscious as French and Italian luxury goods are important status symbols in the newly affluent region. The opinions of Asian shoppers are beginning to matter more and more as growth in more mature markets slows down.
“In Asia, in a certain segment, you can’t offer a product made in China or made in Asia,” said Patrizio di Marco, president and chief executive of Bottega Veneta, on the sidelines of a luxury goods conference in Tokyo. “They are very aware of where the product was made, and whether it was made in Italy, made in France.”

But that only represents Asia’s fashion elite, when it comes to more accessible designer brands, consumers may be less prejudiced than some producers think. They might even by willing to indulge in fakes - for you never know where the fakes come from.

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Are global financial institutions proving to be defunked in the face of inflation and a global food crisis, and is it up to Asia as the emerging center of world power to take the lead in finding solutions? Business leaders who met at the annual World Economic Forum on East Asia, a high-profile gathering of business and government leaders, in Kuala Lumpur earlier this week seem to think so.

“Global institutions are inadequate. They are not responding to global challenges,” Yashwant Sinha, a former finance minister of India said while citing record-high crude oil prices. Rapid increases in the price of rice and other agriculture products have set off riots and protests from Africa to Asia and elevated fears of a global food crisis, reported the International Herald Tribune.

“I would say that this is where there is an opportunity for Asia,” said Sinha, who is now a member of the Indian Parliament. “There are a whole host of things that Asian nations can do together. We must start writing the rules of the game.”

Asian countries must help each other in dealing with crises because the United States can no longer be expected to be “the locomotive of the global economy,” said Yoshimi Watanabe, the Japanese minister of financial services and administrative reforms. “The Asian countries are in the same boat, we share the same destiny,” he said.

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A recently held wine auction in Hong Kong sold US$8.2 million of fine vintages and smashed at least five world auction records for some of the world’s finest wines clocking Asia’s largest such sale till date.

Asia primirarily a fruit and rice wine consuming continent is now gulping down more of the fermented grape drink. According to Vinexpo/IWSR’s research for Asia, wine consumption increased by 10.4 percent in 2004-05 and by 8 percent in 2005-06.

They’ve also predicted that wine consumption would increase by 11.856 hectoliters until 2011, up 48 percent twice that of the period from 2002-2006 and also eight times as much as that of other countries in the world. Asian wine consmption is also expected to account for 4.8 percent of global wine consumption till 2011.

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Shanghai vaulted into the ranks of the world’s leading centres of commerce, becoming one of eight Asian cities among the top 25, while Mumbai, improved its tally by 3 notches, emerging as the 7th most preferred destination for investment in 2008, a study by MasterCard said.

Tokyo retained its spot as Asia’s top commercial centre — and number three globally — while Singapore overtook Hong Kong which ranks sixth globally to move into fourth spot overall, the MasterCard Worldwide Centres of Commerce Index said.

“Asia’s dominance among the top 25 cities globally demonstrates the growing importance of Asian cities to a progressively urbanised global economy,” MasterCard said in a press release.

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Its been a bad begining to the week for Asia. Following a slide on Wall Street on Friday when crude oil neared US$140, and the latest emplyment data showed a steep increase in U.S. unemployment, shares on most Asian bourses have fallen.

Fears that the United States may be heading for a recession were re-ignited after the Labour Department said Friday that the U.S. unemployment rate jumped to 5.5 percent in May from 5.0 percent in April. It was the biggest monthly increase since February 1986 Forbes reported.

On Monday, South Korea’s KOSPI fell 23.35 points or 1.3 percent to close at 1,808.96, In Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 index finished down 308.06 points or 2.1 percent at 14,181.38, Singapore’s Straits Times index closed down 62.71 points or 2 percent at 3,084.02, and the Kuala Lumpur Composite Index (KLCI) fell 17.59 points or 1.4 percent to 1,230.98, off a low of 1,223.45. The Taiwan weighted index closed down 1.8 percent at 8,587.96, while the Jakarta composite index closed up 7.84 points or 0.3 percent at 2,410.08, off a low of 2,352.60. India’s Sensex provisionally ended 444.14 points or 2.85 percent lower at 15,128.04.

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