Evelyn S. Devadason is an Associate Professor at the Faculty of Economics and Administration, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. She received her Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Malaya in 2006. Her research focuses on international trade, with specific focus on production networks, trade–labor linkages, trade-environment issues, and regional integration issues. Her research work has seen print in international journals (indexed in SSCI and ASCI) such as the World Development, The China Review, Journal of Contemporary Asia, Journal of Contemporary China, Asian Economic Journal, Global Economic Review and Asia Pacific Education Review. She has also been engaged in a number of international collaborative research projects, including the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions-Asian and Pacific Regional Organization (ICFTU-APRO, Singapore), Asian Development Bank Institute (ADBI, Japan), the Asian Development Bank (ADB, Manila) and more recently, the World Bank (WB, Washington DC).
Malaysia: A Base for the Growing Asia-Middle East Market?
With the shift in the direction of Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries’ trade from the West to Asia and the emphasis on the “Islamic connection” by Malaysia and many of its Middle Eastern counterparts, Malaysia-GCC economic cooperation appears to be gaining momentum. Malaysia’s strategic location at the center of Southeast Asia and the need for as well as the apparent determination of Malaysia and the GCC countries to diversify their export markets could provide the impetus for this partnership to flourish.
