"Services are a new force for innovation, trade, and growth in East Asia and Pacific. The dramatic diffusion of digital technologies and partial policy reforms in services—from finance, communication, and transport to retail, health, and education—is transforming these economies. The result is higher productivity and changing jobs in the services sector, as well as in the manufacturing sectors that use these services.
A region that has thrived through openness to trade and investment in manufacturing still maintains innovation-inhibiting barriers to entry and competition in key services sectors. Services Unbound: Digital Technologies and Policy Reform in East Asia and Pacific makes the case for deeper domestic reforms and greater international cooperation to unleash a virtuous cycle of increased economic opportunity and enhanced human capacity that would power development in the region."
