Singapore, Qatar and United Arab Emirates top new Belt and Road Index, India ranked 14th

Singapore, Qatar and United Arab Emirates top the Belt and Road Index by Knight Frank, the independent global property consultancy, aimed at helping investors understand potential opportunities that China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) could generate beyond its borders. India is ranked 14^th.

The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) was launched by China in 2013, with an aim to revive the great Silk Road as well as provide a new platform for multilateral cooperation to create new trade routes, economic links and business networks. Six economic corridors have been identified from China to Central and South Asia, the Middle East and Europe (the Silk Road Economic Belt) and along a maritime route, from Southeast Asia, Oceania to the Middle East, Africa, and Europe (the 21^st Century Maritime Silk Road).

The inaugural New Frontiers: The 2018 Report’s Belt and Road Index assesses 67 countries considered core to China’s initiative. The index is classified into six categories: economic potential, demographic advantage, infrastructure development, institutional effectiveness, market accessibility and resilience to natural disasters. Values for these six categories have been normalised from the various data sources and are assigned specific weightage that commensurate with their perceived importance to investment decisions.

The Index points out that Southeast Asian countries rank favourably, especially Malaysia and Vietnam. Apart from Singapore, many Southeast Asian countries are confronted with major infrastructure financing deficits. Chinese companies are well-placed to plug those gaps.

Middle Eastern countries diverge in their BARI rankings, reflecting the potential and challenges that co-exist in the region. While Qatar, UAE, Bahrain, Oman and Saudi Arabia are in the top half and Iraq and Yemen sit in the bottom half.

Over the last four years notably along the BRI, Singapore (USD 3.87 billion), Malaysia (USD 2.37 billion) and South Korea (USD 2.74 billion) are the top recipients of Chinese outbound real estate investment which totalled USD 10.2 billion. Slightly over half of this total amount (USD 5.2 billion) was spent on purchasing development sites, while another third (USD 3.1 billion) was spent on office space.

“The Belt and Road Initiative is a long-term strategy that will play out over decades, not simply years. Therefore, it will take patient capital that is prepared to look at new frontier markets with greater levels of country risk and at greenfield projects that have a long-term time horizon. For many, this transition away from pure-play, low-risk investment, requires detailed market knowledge and advice in terms of deal sourcing, evaluation, execution and asset management,” says Nicholas Holt, Head of Research, Knight Frank Asia Pacific.

Kevin Coppel, Regional Head, Knight Frank Asia Pacific, says, “The Belt and Road Initiative is one of the clearest manifestations of China’s vision and influence. The infrastructure and investment underpinning the BRI will streamline trade flows and lift economic activity in much of Asia, the Middle East, and North and Eastern Africa. While the vision will bring huge opportunities for investors and developers, the BRI will also change the face of corporate China, which will have an enormous influence in the 21st century as Chinese brands become household names around the world.”