Daily Mail Tips - Investment in Emerging Markets

Daily Mail Tips - Investment in Emerging Markets

Apala Lahiri Chavan talks about the issues in involved in designing for emerging markets - Download the free poster and a white paper www.humanfactors.com Transcript: Designing for Emerging Markets with Apala Lahiri Chavan, MA, MSc, CUA I'm Apala, and I had head a practice in cross cultural design and design for emerging markets. Some people think that you just need to translate the language of your design, switch currencies, and maybe reformat some fields, but actually it usually does not work like that. For example, if you sell deodorants and count the over four billion armpits to be deodorized, that is between India and China, you might feel it's a done deal as long as the product is available in those markets. Yeah, maybe with local language text on the packaging, but, alas, the reality of the ecosystem of your consumers in India and China are very different and very complex and, hence, need much more to be done to actually get the two billion consumers to use your product. I worked on a dialysis unit to be used at home, which worked in America just fine, but in Columbia and India, the story was different. Why? Well, the caregivers who were critical to the successful use of the dialysis unit was so much more relaxed just as a cultural attribute. So what was the impact of that relaxed attitude? Instead of heating the solution to the exact temperature, they would often keep the bag with the solution on the roof to heat in the sunlight or wrap the bag with a blanket for ...

HFI Animate: How to Design for Emerging Markets with Apala Lahiri Chavan

In an article this weekend on investment, the Daily Mail tips Brazil as a top emerging market and ideal for investment. While the article focuses essentially on funds in countries such as China, India and Brazil for investment, Brazil property investment undoubtedly represents a significant opportunity as well.

According to the Daily Mail, emerging markets have come into their own over the last six months. This is particularly the case of the so-called BIC nations (Brazil, India and China) where economic growth in this year's second quarter has been extremely positive. As well as their renewed growth - unique in the world at the moment - the outlook for the immediate future in emerging markets is bright. Recent World Bank figures predict that GDP growth in non-OECD countries in 2010 will reach a 4.4%, almost four times higher than the increase in OECD countries which is expected to come in at just 1.2%.

 

This beacon of light beaming from emerging markets is a sharp contrast to the prospects for most Western countries over the next year or so. In spite of the appearance of the much-acclaimed 'green shoots' in some countries and the recent Morgan Stanley prediction that the Footsie 100 would break the 6,000 threshold next year, the outlook for the bulk of the world's developed economies remains bleak. In addition, Western countries will take several years to repay their current debts.

When faced with this scenario, investors have unsurprisingly turned to emerging markets, which the Daily Mail claims win "hands down" when it comes to investment. Funds in emerging markets have been performing so well that many wealth managers are now advising investors to place 40% of their funds in these markets.

According to one of the experts quoted in the article, emerging markets are "the future" and will be the source of "future growth in profits and earnings".

When it comes to property investment, Brazil easily offers the most. Buying property in Brazil is straightforward whereas investment in property in China and India is fraught with obstacles for the foreigner. Unlike some developing countries, Brazil has a well established democracy. The Brazilian President, Lula da Silva, is a highly respected figure and at key world summits such as the G20 held last April, Lula takes centre stage.

Add to this the year-round warm climate in many of Brazil's top tourist spots (e.g. Natal in north east Brazil) plus the fact that investment in luxury properties in Brazil comes in at a fraction of the prices seen in other popular investment destinations and the emerging market of Brazil is certainly the future for property investment.  

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