Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank’s president Mr. Jin Liqun shares with JIPD Editor-in-Chief, Dr. Gu Qingyang, his passion for infrastructure finance, as he reflects upon his goal of steering an environmentally friend and corruption-free AIIB toward building social-impacting infrastructure across Asia.
From governmental departments to international financial institutes, Mr. Jin Liqun has undertaken almost every essential role in finance. With his vast experience across the private and public sectors, particularly in multilateral development banks, Mr. Jin Liqun currently serves as Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB)’s first President since its founding in 2016, following a stint as Secretary-General of the Multilateral Interim Secretariat created to establish the bank. Beginning from his two decades of governmental experience at the Chinese Ministry of Finance, rising from the rank of Deputy Director General to Vice Minister, Mr. Jin was then called to serve as Vice President, and then Ranking Vice President, of the Asian Development Bank, and later as Alternate Executive Director for China at the World Bank and at the Global Environment Facility. Mr. Jin had also served as Chairman of China International Capital Corporation Ltd., China’s first joint-venture investment bank, in addition to serving as Chairman of the Supervisory Board of the sovereign wealth fund China Investment Corporation and as Chairman of the International Forum of Sovereign Wealth Funds.

This paper uses a new cross-country cross-industry dataset on investment in tangible and intangible assets for 18 European countries and the US.  We set out a framework for measuring intangible investment and capital stocks and their effect on output, inputs and total factor productivity. The analysis provides evidence on the diffusion of intangible investment across Europe and the US over the years 2000-2013 and offers growth accounting evidence before and after the Great Recession in 2008-2009. Our major findings are the following. First, tangible investment fell massively during the Great Recession and has hardly recovered, whereas intangible investment has been relatively resilient and recovered fast in the US but lagged behind in the EU. Second, the sources of growth analysis including only national account intangibles (software, R&D, mineral exploration and artistic originals), suggest that capital deepening is the main driver of growth, with tangibles and intangibles accounting for 80% and 20% in the EU while both account for 50% in the US, over 2000-2013. Extending the asset boundary to the intangible assets not included in the national accounts (Corrado, Hulten and Sichel (2005)) makes capital deepening increase. The contribution of tangibles is reduced both in the EU and the US (60% and 40% respectively) while intangibles account for a larger share (40% in EU and 60% in the US). Then, our analysis shows that since the Great Recession, the slowdown in labour productivity growth has been driven by a decline in TFP growth with relatively a minor role for tangible and intangible capital. Finally, we document a significant correlation between stricter employment protection rules and less government investment in R&D, and a lower ratio of intangible to tangible investment.

Chinese municipalities have developed a large stock of capital assets during a period of rapid growth and urbanization, but have yet to modernize asset management practices. Cities face challenges such as premature decline of fixed assets and spiking liabilities related to operating and maintaining assets. This paper evaluates the asset management practices in three selected small cities and towns in China, using a benchmarking assessment tool followed by an in-depth field assessment. The paper finds that overall performance is below half the international benchmark for good practice in all three cities. Management practices are considerably more advanced for land than for buildings and infrastructure. Key deficiencies in data availability and reporting, governance, capacity, and financial management indicate increased risks for local government finance and the delivery of public services. For small cities and towns where public revenues are often uncertain and limited, urban public services will be at risk of deterioration unless good asset management practices are put in place. The paper recommends strategic actions for upper and lower levels of government, to advance local asset management practices and facilitate the reform agenda.

Infrastructure development is critical for sustaining Asia’s economic growth. Unfortunately, huge financing gaps—estimated by a recent Asian Development Bank study to be USD22.5 trillion—constrain the ability of most emerging Asian countries to fully realize the benefits of infrastructure development. For instance, over 70% of infrastructure investments in Asia are still funded by public resources, which pose acute financing challenges for many countries with limited budgets and fiscal constraints. This paper discusses some of the challenges associated with public financing of infrastructure projects in emerging Asian countries, before introducing some new options for alleviating their infrastructure investment needs. In particular, it proposes a new approach to infrastructure financing by utilizing the spillover effects of infrastructure investment, where additional revenues generated from such investment can be channeled back to investors as subsidy to increase the returns to their investment. The paper also argues the need for Asian countries to implement fiscal reforms and to develop a more balanced approach to financing, one that involves both the private and public sector. 

Using a Global Trade Analysis Project (GTAP) model, and China as the base for analytical comparison, this paper shows that there are significant economic benefits to China and the participating countries along all six Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) economic corridors. However, to maximize these benefits, the social and environmental risks need to be well managed. The analysis shows a clear sequencing in terms of priority corridors. Two corridors have minimal investments and immediate returns, two corridors have significant investments with huge returns, and two corridors have high investments with lower returns. Overall, the paper demonstrates that to ensure the sustainability of any BRI corridor development, there is a need to consider its costs and benefits from the economic, social and environmental perspectives.

This problem is a solar hut photovoltaic cell in the attached and overhead two installation methods, the type of photovoltaic cells and array mode and inverter type optimization design issues. In question 1, since the photovoltaic cells are attached to the roof and exterior surfaces, the direction and angle of the battery are uniquely determined by the direction and angle of the attached surface. The problem is translated to optimize the installation of a certain type on a single surface area (array) of photovoltaic cells, so that the total amount of solar photovoltaic power generation as much as possible, and the unit power generation costs as small as possible, which is a multi-objective optimization problem. The problem can be discussed in the ideal environment in a single surface area of the battery installation optimization program, and then the actual environment of the multi-surface optimization. In the solution to Problem 1, the unit on the south of the roof of the battery at the moment to accept the solar energy formula is generated. The definition of and is the moment of direct radiation intensity, for the moment the sun and the south of the roof of the plane where the angle, for the level of horizontal radiation intensity, for the south of the roof and the horizontal angle, the planefor the plane, the center of the heart, the vertical upward direction is the axis of the positive coordinate system, obtained with the sun height angle , the sun azimuth , red angle, angle and the sun when the relationship is generated. The conclusion is only installed in the small roof surface type of battery C11, and the rest of the surface is not installed. 35 years of electricity generation is 77126 degrees, the economic benefits of 16,488 yuan, the recovery period of 21.3 years. In question 2, because the photovoltaic cells in the roof and the external wall surface can be installed overhead, the panel orientation and tilt will affect the efficiency of photovoltaic cells. Therefore, in the optimization scheme of Problem 1, the orientation and inclination of the panel on each surface are further adjusted to calculate the optimum orientation and inclination of the panel on each surface. The problem can be in the ideal weather environment to establish the sun running and the battery board efficiency model, and then the measured environment test. The optimal orientation of the panel is southward, and the optimal angle with the ground plane is 39.89 degrees. The conclusion is only installed in the small roof surface type of battery C11, and the rest of the surface is not installed. 35 years of generating capacity of 82165.2 degrees, the economic benefits of 18,998 yuan, the recovery period of 13 years. In question 3, by the optimization of the above two issues, in the building to meet the requirements of the hut under the design of the various aspects of the cabin and battery installation, and further optimize the total power generation of the hut, economic benefits. The whole model solver is run in MATLAB7.0.