Malaysia

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, Malaysia undertook a series of vigorous reforms, ranging from the improvement of regulatory framework to the digitalisation of the economy, with the aim of boosting productivity. While the protracted pandemic has inevitably stalled reform efforts in many countries, including Malaysia, strengthening the business climate has become all the more important. This will be essential to achieve a robust recovery, accelerate digitalisation, and adopt a new working environment combining productivity and sanitary precautions. This paper discusses: 1) how Malaysia can reinvigorate business dynamism with new regulatory reforms; 2) how it can boost the uptake by businesses of digital solutions; and 3) based on the recent experience of teleworking, how it can prepare an enabling working environment for the digital age.

Regulation is one of the key tools governments can use to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic and move towards recovery. While the pandemic underscores the need for well-designed, evidence-based regulatory policies, the extraordinary pressures it imposed often forced governments to shorten procedures and launch new forms of co-ordination to urgently pass regulatory measures. This can make regulatory policy making more challenging, but also provides opportunities to innovate. This policy brief analyses how Southeast Asian (SEA) countries approached these challenges and opportunities, and shares lessons learned and practices among the SEA and OECD communities.

This review analyses regulatory barriers to competition in the logistics sector in Malaysia, with the goal of helping the government make regulation more pro-competitive while fostering long-lasting growth. This report is based on a competition assessment of laws and regulations conducted by the OECD in the framework of the project 'Fostering Competition in Asean'. Besides developing recommendations to promote the competitive and efficient functioning of markets under review, this report also includes estimates of how the implementation of certain recommendations could impact the economy. An OECD Competitive Neutrality Review of Small-package Delivery Services in Malaysia was launched together with this study.

This review analyses regulatory barriers to competition in the logistics sector in ASEAN, with the goal of helping authorities make regulation more pro-competitive while fostering long-lasting growth. This report is based on a competition assessment of laws and regulations conducted by the OECD in the framework of the project 'Fostering Competition in Asean'. Besides developing recommendations to promote the competitive and efficient functioning of markets under review, this report also includes estimates of how the implementation of certain recommendations could impact the economy. An OECD Competitive Neutrality Review of Small-package Delivery Services in ASEAN was launched together with this study.

Like many other countries, Malaysia was hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic starting in early 2020. Its past policy prudence has allowed Malaysia to react swiftly and boldly to the public health and economic crisis. Nevertheless, the crisis revealed the necessity of further reforms that Malaysia needs to pursue in order to achieve more inclusive and high growth after the pandemic. Vulnerable workers have been more affected during the pandemic and many firms have been urged to use digital tools, such as e-commerce and teleworking, for the first time. Going forward, strengthening social protection is of utmost important to improve the well-being of the Malaysian people, including self-employed workers, and prepare for the ageing society. Easing government regulations further is crucial to stimulate business dynamism and restore vigorous growth. Accelerating digitalisation will be key for Malaysian firms to become more productive in the post-pandemic era. Along with its further economic development, Malaysia needs to transform itself into a greener economy. SPECIAL FEATURES: PRODUCT MARKET REGULATION; DIGITALISATION; TELEWORKING

Like many other countries, Malaysia was hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic starting in early 2020. Its past policy prudence has allowed Malaysia to react swiftly and boldly to the public health and economic crisis. Nevertheless, the crisis revealed the necessity of further reforms that Malaysia needs to pursue in order to achieve more inclusive and high growth after the pandemic. Vulnerable workers have been more affected during the pandemic and many firms have been urged to use digital tools, such as e-commerce and teleworking, for the first time. Going forward, strengthening social protection is of utmost important to improve the well-being of the Malaysian people, including self-employed workers, and prepare for the ageing society. Easing government regulations further is crucial to stimulate business dynamism and restore vigorous growth. Accelerating digitalisation will be key for Malaysian firms to become more productive in the post-pandemic era. Along with its further economic development, Malaysia needs to transform itself into a greener economy. SPECIAL FEATURES: PRODUCT MARKET REGULATION; DIGITALISATION; TELEWORKING

With only a decade left to reduce emissions drastically, the scale, pace and extent of global transformation needed is truly demanding. Long-term emission goals and the nature of the low-emission transition in each country will be a function of its unique socio-economic priorities, capabilities, resource endowment, vision for post 2050 economic structure, and social and political acceptability of what constitutes a just transition. As we enter the 'decade for delivery', a whole of economy approach is needed to realise the low-emission transition. This includes focusing not only on upscaling zero and near-zero emitting technologies and businesses but also supporting, to the extent possible, the progressive lowering of emissions in high emitting and hard to abate sectors. In this context, 'transition finance' is gaining traction among governments and market participants. To identify the core features of transition finance, this paper reviews 12 transition relevant taxonomies, guidance and principles by public (Japan, Singapore, Malaysia, Russia, European Union, EBRD) and private actors (Climate Bonds Initiative, International Capital Markets Association, Research Institute for Environmental Finance Japan, AXA Investment Managers and DBS), as well as 39 transition relevant financial instruments (vanilla transition bonds, key performance indicator-linked fixed income securities). This paper does not aim to define transition finance, but rather to review emerging approaches and instruments to highlight commonalities, divergences as well as issues to consider for coherent market development and progress towards global environmental objectives. Based on the review, this paper puts forth two preliminary views. First, that the essence of transition finance is triggering entity-wide change to reduce exposure to transition risk; second, that transition finance may be better understood as capital market instruments with a set of core functions/attributes rather than a specific format or label.

The world is increasingly facing a technologically changing employment landscape and such changes are directly affecting the future demand for skills. For regional economies built on labour migration, the impending changes will affect migrants and their families, their countries of origin and the recruitment systems they are attached to – and ultimately disrupt the development benefits of migration. This paper investigates how the future of the employment landscape will affect migration within the Abu Dhabi Dialogue, a regional consultative process for migration in Asia. It investigates the impending changes in the demand for skills in countries of destination, how such changes will affect migration processes and whether countries of origin are ready for the changes. It provides recommendations on how regional consultative processes can foster dialogue between key actors from both countries of origin and destination to better navigate future changes and ensure a smooth transition.