20 Quotes by Ifzal Ali

Asian governments are making significant progress in the fight against poverty.

Asia needs to make sure its demographic dividend doesn't turn out to be its biggest problem. All those people arriving at urban train stations could be a big plus or a big minus.

Asia is cruising at a fairly fast clip but there are certain clouds on the horizon.

This is a change of historic proportions that will pose huge development challenges. You saw what happened with one flood in Bombay last year -- we could see similar and growing risks across Asia.

Despite all of this, we continue to be cautiously optimistic on developing Asia.

Strong economic growth alone won't solve the problem.

In India, for example, we could step back from 7-8 per cent growth to 3-4 per cent growth very easily within five to six years if unemployment and underemployment is not addressed.

In Asia, for a long time we have been in denial about the sustainability of high oil prices. There is tremendous potential for Asia to improve efficiency.

In order for rapid population growth to matter, a nation must steadily create good, decent- paying jobs to benefit from it.