Infrastructure gap in Asia remains huge: report

Aerial photo taken on March 20, 2019 shows the International Conference Center in Boao Town of Qionghai City, south CHINA's Hainan Province.This year's annual conference of the Boao Forum for Asia (BFA), scheduled from March 26 to 29 in Boao, a coastal town in CHINA's southern island province of Hainan, is themed "Shared Future, Concerted Action, Common Development." (Xinhua)

Ballooning population, urbanization and industrial development in Asia have called for immense infrastructure investments in the region, according to a report released by the Boao Forum for Asia (BFA) Tuesday.

Asia's infrastructure investment gap constantly constitutes 30 percent of the gap in the world and will grow linearly to 252 billion U.S. dollars in 2040, the Asian Financial Development Report on Infrastructure Finance said, citing data from the Global Infrastructure Outlook, a G20 initiative.

The Belt and Road Initiative, proposed by CHINA in 2013, has made remarkable achievement in improving connectivity after its five-year implementation, the report said.

Still, there remain many shared challenges faced by Asian economies on infrastructure finance, including rising public debt burden, lack of policy support for private sector participation and difficulty for local markets to attract long-term investors, the report said.

The report urged better policy coordination as well as further development of local financial markets to improve infrastructure development in Asia.

It also called for the establishment of smart, green and sustainable infrastructure for the new era.

The BFA annual conference runs from March 26 to 29 in Boao, a coastal town in CHINA's southern island province of Hainan.