APO RELEASES 2025 PRODUCTIVITY DATABOOK, ADDS AFGHANISTAN, MALDIVES TO COVERAGE

KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 9 (Bernama) -- The Asian Productivity Organization (APO) has released the 18th edition of its annual Productivity Databook, providing a comprehensive overview of productivity and economic growth trends across 33 Asian economies from 1970 to 2023, along with projections through 2035.

According to APO in a statement, the 2025 edition marks an expansion in coverage, with Afghanistan and the Maldives included for the first time.

In total, the Databook covers the 21 APO member economies and 12 nonmember economies, while referencing data from major advanced economies such as Australia, France, Germany, Italy, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States for comparison.

Built on the APO Productivity Database (APO-PDB) 2025, this edition aligns level comparisons with the 2021 International Comparison Program purchasing power parity benchmark and integrates the Asia Quality-adjusted Labor Input Database (AQALI) and the Asia Natural Resources Database (ANRD) to enhance the measurement of labour quality and natural-resource assets.

The Databook presents productivity accounts for multiple regional groupings, including Asia27 (which encompasses the APO21 plus Afghanistan, Bhutan, Brunei, China, the Maldives, and Myanmar), the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), East Asia, and the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC). This enables consistent and comparative analyses across regions.

Among the key trends observed, the Databook tracks Asia’s economic transformation over more than five decades, with particular attention to labour productivity growth, shifts in industrial demand and structure, and real income movements.

Decompositions of productivity per worker and per hour worked offer deeper insights into the sources of growth and the impact of structural changes.

By incorporating natural resource data and quality-adjusted labour input, the report also refines estimates of total factor productivity (TFP)—a critical indicator for assessing long-term economic competitiveness.

The full report and supporting datasets are available for download on the APO’s official website.

-- BERNAMA