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The main objective of this paper is to overview the developments of Japan's ODA and assess, in a quantitative manner, their economic impacts on Asian countries. The benefits of two alternative measures—one from capital formation by Japan's ODA loans and the other from import liberalization in the Japanese market—are compared. Those economy-wide impacts of aid and trade on six Asian countries—China, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam—are estimated by a CGE model of global trade, incorporating a certain mechanism of dynamic capital formation. Japan's ODA loans are effective for economic growth in the countries. Real GDP gains range from 0.1 to 1.6% annually. Trade liberalization is efficient to improve economic welfare. Utility gains range from 0.2 to 1.9%, which exceed those on account of Japan's ODA. Variations in those economic impacts are much more significantly observed when examined by sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Describes the economic development of Asia and the history of Japanese industrial policy. Initiatives launched by the Japanese government to increase its international presence in the late 1980s; Support given by the World Bank to Japan; Role of the Japanese foreign aid program in bailing out Japanese industry from the effects of the high yen.

The article discusses cases, comparisons and contrast between Japan and the rest of Asia. The leaders of Japan were aware what was going on in rest of world. They leaned of Western scientific achievements and economic changes. They knew the great new economic and military power of England, the United States, and of other Western countries. Japan's own economic organization had already undergone an evolution of lesser degree but of the same kind as that which preceded the coming of the factory system in several Occidental countries. Japan already had a fairly elaborate division of occupations, based on handicraft, both retail and wholesale. A large urban population had grown up in the castle towns, especially at the Shogun's capital in Tokyo. These economic conditions did not differ too widely from those prevailing in other parts of Asia, especially in parts of India and China. There, too, were native merchants and workers, considerable production for near and some distant sale, and facilities for loaning and transferring money. Those countries also had considerable foreign trade. The difference lied in the industrialization and modernization in Japan, which was not there in any other part of Asia.