FDI Inflow, ICT Expansion and Economic Growth: An Empirical Study on Asia-Pacific Developing Countries

Abstract

This article attempts to examine the dynamic interrelationships among foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows, information and communication technology (ICT) expansion and economic growth empirically in the Asia-Pacific developing countries over the period of 2001–2017. Besides the significant economic effects of FDI inflows, several existing evidence also documents that progress of ICT plays a crucial role in promoting the productivity and efficiency particularly in developing economies during the present period, implying that ICT should be incorporated in a wide discussed FDI and economic growth relationship as per current necessitate. Moreover, different theories and empirics refer that FDI and ICT are also interrelated in various ways. In this context, 30 developing countries are chosen from the Asia-Pacific region to conduct some advanced panel data econometric exercises using the World Bank (2018) and World Telecommunication Indicators (2018) databases. Empirical estimations applying the panel fully modified ordinary least square, dynamic ordinary least square, pooled mean group estimator, mean group estimator and dynamic fixed effect methods reveal that both FDI and ICT have positive and significant effects on economic growth, and ICT expansion also positively influences FDI inflows in those countries. So, the ICT should be improved more as an infrastructure to receive more FDI inflows and also to experience better economic growth.