FT社评 新兴经济体亟需结构改革

It was not too long ago that the emerging markets were regularly eulogised as the permanent powerhouses of the world economy. During the 2000s, with excitable neologisms like Brics (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) coined in their honour, the big emerging economies drove a boom in global output and trade.

直到不久前，新兴市场还常常被誉为世界经济的“永动机”。在2000年代，大型新兴经济体推动了全球产出和贸易的繁荣，人们创造了“金砖国家”（Brics，指巴西、俄罗斯、印度、中国和南非）等有意思的新词向其致敬。

And when the rich world suffered a dislocating shock during the financial crisis in 2008, many middle-income nations, with relatively resilient banking systems and large foreign exchange reserves, rode out the turbulence and rapidly resumed growing.

而且，当2008年金融危机让富裕世界陷入混乱时，许多中等收入国家凭借抵御力相对较强的的银行体系和庞大的外汇储备走出了动荡，并迅速恢复了增长。

That euphoria, which has been subsiding for years, is now at a low ebb. This week the World Bank warned of a “structural slowdown” as developing nations ceded the leading role on global growth to the rich world. A decline in import demand means emerging markets subtracted from world trade growth in the first quarter of this year for the first time since 2009.

几年来，这种欣快感一直在消退，如今则已陷入低潮。上周，世界银行(World Bank)警告称，发展中国家面临一场“结构性放缓”，它们把全球增长“领头羊”的地位让给了富裕世界。进口需求下滑意味着，今年第一季度新兴市场对世界贸易增长的贡献出现了下降，这是2009年来的首次。

In reality, weaknesses within the emerging world have been evident for some time. Few countries have built the kind of diverse high-productivity economy that will propel them into the first rank of rich states.

事实上，新兴世界的弱点已暴露出来一段时间了。没有几个新兴国家建立起了那种足以推动它们跻身世界一流富国行列的多元化高效经济。

According to a study by the International Monetary Fund, the slowdown in trend growth in middle-income countries has been in train since the crisis. For years, weak productivity improvements were masked by low interest rates, helped by quantitative easing in the US, and by high commodity prices.

根据国际货币基金组织(IMF)的一份研究报告，自金融危机以来，中等收入国家的趋势增长率下降就开始了。多年来，生产率改善进展不大，这一点被低利率（得益于美国的量化宽松）和大宗商品价格高企掩盖住了。

Those props are now being kicked away and, with the US Federal Reserve yet to raise rates, there may still be a bigger squeeze to come. The growth model of countries like Brazil has been exposed. Chronic deficits, high inflation and an overvalued exchange rate have left the country with no alternative but tighter monetary policy and a recession. The evaporation of a favourable external environment exposes the past failure to reform. One or two leaders, such as Narendra Modi in India and Joko Widodo in Indonesia, are belatedly trying to reorient government spending away from wasteful subsidies and towards productive investment, but it will take time.

如今，这些支撑因素正被移除，考虑到美联储(Fed)早晚会加息，新兴世界未来或许还将面临更大的挤压。巴西等国家的增长模式已暴露于风险中。长期赤字、高通胀率和被高估的汇率，使得巴西别无选择，只能收紧货币政策、接受衰退。有利外部环境的消失，暴露出这些国家过去未能实施改革。有一两位新兴国家领导人，比如印度的纳伦德拉•莫迪(Narendra Modi)和印尼的佐科•维多多(Joko Widodo)，进行了姗姗来迟的尝试——调整政府开支、减少浪费性补贴、增加有助提高生产率的投资，但这些尝试要想见效还需要时间。

The process of poor countries getting rich, much of which used to be driven by export-led manufacturing, has become more complex. Emerging economies are routinely turning away from manufacturing at much lower levels of income than earlier waves of industrialisers. An apparent structural fall in trade growth relative to overall expansion, probably as a result of nations like China taking more of their supply chains in-country, means less chance for other developing countries to export their way to prosperity.

以往穷国主要靠出口导向的制造业实现富裕，如今这一过程变得更加复杂了。相对于前几波实现工业化的国家，新兴经济体如今常常在制造业收入降到低得多的水平时才放弃制造业。贸易增长相对于总体增长似乎发生了结构性下降——原因很可能是中国等国将供应链更多地转移到国内——意味着其他发展中国家通过出口实现繁荣的机会更小了。

Many development economists talk of a “middle-income trap”, where economies stall at relatively low levels of per capita gross domestic product. To increase trend growth, emerging markets will have to address the full range of structural impediments to expansion. This means not just the traditional issues of streamlining regulation and building infrastructure but also the more complex challenges of improving education, promoting competition and designing regulation to develop high value-added service sectors.

许多研究发展问题的经济学家会提到“中等收入陷阱”，这是指经济发展到人均国内生产总值(GDP)还相对较低时就停滞不前了。为了提高趋势增长率，新兴经济体必须清除阻碍经济扩张的一切结构性障碍。这意味着，不仅要解决理顺监管和建设基础设施等传统问题，而且要应对更复杂的挑战——改善教育，促进竞争，以及进行监管设计、以发展高附加值的服务业。

Even if that happens, it is unlikely to show big improvements in the short term. Economies do not instantaneously leap on to a long-term high-growth path even if the right policies are followed. But if emerging countries are to return to leading global economic growth, there is no other way. For emerging markets, the years of easy growth from cheap money and fat commodity earnings are over. The need for reform has now become acute.

即便做到以上这些，也不太可能令经济在短期内出现重大改善。就算采取了正确政策，各经济体也不会立刻跳上一条长期高增长之路。但如果新兴经济体想要夺回引领全球经济增长的领头羊地位，就没有其他选择。对新兴经济体而言，廉价货币和丰厚大宗商品利润带来轻松增长的年代已经过去了。如今它们亟需改革。