The greatest bottleneck for a civilisation's development in the modern world is its infrastructure. As populations increase, people's needs and demands increase, the opportunity for industry increases, wages and disposable income increase, and thus you have a cycle of growth.
However, none of this is possible if there aren't good roads, bridges, and railways that people can use to move from home to work and to deliver products from manufacturers to consumers. This is one of the biggest issues holding back development in the Global South.
Now, as international investors step up to fill these infrastructure voids, we see incredible stories of growth and development.
In South Asia alone, millions of people have been lifted out of poverty in the last decade, and a growing middle class has emerged in the region. More growth demands more infrastructure to sustain it. The Asian Development Bank (ADB) produced a research finding in 2009 stating that collective infrastructure investments of USD 8 trillion will be necessary to continue rapid economic development in Asian countries.
Building infrastructure, however, is one of the most expensive projects a nation can partake in. And sometimes, a nation can only get the money to build infrastructure from another nation. Therefore, it makes sense to look at nations from the lens of potential investors and investees.
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