Asia-Pacific Sustainable Development Journal - Volume 25, Issue 2, 2019

This paper considers income inequality in Asia and the Pacific, examining whether there has been an increase or decrease in income inequality among countries in the region in recent decades. By analysing the position of countries’ GDP per capita relative to that of a reference economy (Australia), the study finds that between the years 1970 and 2014, most of the region’s less affluent countries were able to catch up in relative terms, allowing them to slowly move up the income matrix towards higher tier groups. Subregional examination reveals that most of the income convergence in the Asia-Pacific region was due to exceptional economic growth in East and North-East Asia and, to a lesser extent, in South-East Asia. While the paper shows that relative income differences between countries in the region have fallen since the 1970s, it points to the need for differentiating between relative and absolute measures of inequality. Insufficient convergence and substantial initial differences in GDP per capita have meant that, despite a decline in relative inequality, absolute differences in average income have grown during the same period.

The search for rigorous, transparent and domain-specific measures of empowerment that can be used for gender analysis is ongoing. This paper explores the added value of a new measure of domain-specific autonomy. This direct measure of motivational autonomy emanates from the “selfdetermination theory” (Ryan and Deci, 2000). We examine in detail the Relative Autonomy Index (RAI) for individuals, using data representative of Bangladeshi rural areas. Based on descriptive statistical analyses, we conclude that the measure and its scale perform broadly well in terms of conceptual validity and reliability. Based on an exploratory analysis of the determinants of autonomy of men and women in Bangladesh, we find that neither age, education nor income are suitable proxies for autonomy. This implies that the RAI adds new information about individuals, and as such, could represent a promising avenue for further empirical exploration as a quantitative, yet nuanced, measure of domain-specific empowerment.

This paper relies on an extensive data set on Nepalese families to examine factors influencing the extent to which maternal health care is provided.

This study aims to empirically establish the co-movement of price indices of seemingly unrelated commodities, suggesting that the Central Bank should not decouple fluctuation in the national price index into volatile and core components. An attempt is also made to understand whether monetary policy can influence the factors responsible for price fluctuations in the states of India. The study becomes especially relevant under Indian conditions where flexible inflation targeting has been adopted by the Reserve Bank of India (Central Bank of India) and achieving the targeted inflation is a primary concern of the Indian government. The results of the empirical analysis clearly reveal that unrelated price indices co-move in India, and that monetary policy initiatives fail to influence the common factors of the states of India. The empirical results have crucial implications for the Reserve Bank of India and, as such, a conscious effort is needed to enable policy to influence the price indices of the states of India.

Although creative economy is emerging as an area to be evaluated, establishing a benchmark against which it can be measured is still problematic due to a range of definitional problems, both conceptual and practical. In recent years, many agencies and governments have invested significant effort into collecting data on creative economy, but in many countries, including Indonesia, measuring creative economy remains a challenge. Data collection on creative economy has been conducted twice in Indonesia, initially through surveys undertaken in 2016 and then in a compilation of the 2016 Economic Census. The data collection used a common classification system to identify the five-digit Indonesia Standard Industrial Classification (KBLI) regarded as creative economy. Out of a total of 1,573 five-digit KBLI codes, there are 223 which are identified as creative economy activities. However, this approach remains unstandardized in terms of concept definitions, data collection procedures, methods of analysis and common classification systems. This paper highlights the numerous limitations in current creative economy measurement in Indonesia, identifying issues and challenges in data collection and creative economy measurement processes that are needed to support the Sustainable Development Goals.