Macroscope | If Eurasia gets its act together, the US-China power balance will shift
- Caught between the East-West power struggle as part of China’s Belt and Road Initiative, Eurasia is increasingly being pushed towards integration
- This would mean a China more fully integrated with Europe, a world less vulnerable to maritime choke points, and the possible toppling of the US as the world’s top economy
While much has been made in recent years of Africa “emerging” strongly, there is another continental area – Eurasia, and Central Asia especially – whose enormous economic potential remains relatively untapped.
If it can get its political and economic act together like Africa is beginning to do, Eurasia, as a united continent of some 90 countries and 5 billion people, has the physical and human resources to become a world beater.
Because of the vast size of this biggest land mass in the world, the landlocked nature of many of its constituent countries and its uneven population distribution, Eurasia lacks the markets and transport infrastructure at present to become a viable single entity.
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Laos takes delivery of train as new China-funded Belt and Road railway nears completion
There is a chicken and egg argument over which comes first – the transport, energy and communications infrastructure needed to support growth or the economic activity and demand needed to justify infrastructure investment. Asia is proving more pragmatic than Western nations on this point.