Regionalization of Trade and Investment in East Asia and Prospects for Further Regional Integration.

Intra-regional trade and investment in East Asia has increased during the last few decades. These flows have accelerated again since the beginning of the 1990s. The recent trade integration in the East Asian region can be explained mainly by the more active and connecting roles of newly industrializing economies (NIEs) rather than by Japan and concentrated FDI flows within the region. Regional financial market integration also helped facilitate this process of trade and investment integration within the region. The concentrated FDI flows have led to the internationalization of production networks, of which ethnic Chinese networks have been particularly significant. East Asian economies are able to seek further regional integration based on these production networks and on newly formed local and subregional integration schemes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]