We used to say the future is Asian. Now the data is showing us that it's the present

For years, the rise of Asia and other developing economies was treated as a story about the future. Governments and businesses around the world acknowledged the trend while keeping their priorities much as they were. This month, the International Monetary Fund’s World Economic Outlook makes it harder to treat this as a future prospect. Its figures show that the shift is already visible in the scale of global production, the sources of growth and the markets companies will need to understand. The great global rebalancing of economic weight – and, indeed, the Asian future – is here.

The clearest measure is output. Last year, emerging and developing economies accounted for 60.5 per cent of world output when measured at purchasing power parity, which adjusts for differences in local prices. China and India together accounted for 27.8 per cent, almost equalling the G7’s 28.4 per cent. On this measure, these two emerging economies now produce almost as much as seven of the world’s established industrial powers. This is a comparison of economic scale, not a claim that incomes or financial influence are evenly distributed. But it shows how far the old picture of a wealthy western core, and a peripheral developing world, has fallen behind reality.

Jeffrey Sachs, professor at Columbia University, captured the moment when he observed that the US and Europe may be approaching the end of a 500-year period of western dominance, and that a truly multipolar world is arriving. This does not mean Europe will lose its prosperity. It means prosperity has spread across more of the world, and the ability of one relatively small part of it to dictate terms to the rest is fading.

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The growth outlook reinforces this shift, while also showing why “emerging markets” should not be treated as one story. The IMF expects the world economy to expand by 3.1 per cent this year and 3.4 per cent next year. Advanced economies are projected to grow by 2.1 per cent this year and 1.8 per cent next year, compared with 3.7 per cent and 4.4 per cent for emerging and developing economies.

Yet faster growth is not broadly shared across every developing economy. The IMF says 32 economies now account for 95 per cent of global growth, compared with 54 economies in its April outlook; about 47 per cent of economies had their forecasts revised down. Growth is concentrated in countries benefiting from technology-related demand or less exposed to the energy shock. That is a more precise reading of the moment: the world has gained new centres of economic activity, but the gains are uneven and the divides between them are widening.

Asia’s growth story is particularly interesting. India is projected to grow by 7 per cent both this year and next, on a fiscal-year basis. Vietnam is forecast to expand by 8.4 per cent this year, Indonesia by 5.1 per cent, and China by 4.5 per cent. Across the Sahel, too, the numbers are encouraging, with growth projected at 4.5 per cent. These are very different economies, but together they show that the sources of expansion now extend well beyond the traditional industrial centres.

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The GCC outlook illustrates how sharply the path can vary from year to year. After the disruption caused by regional conflict, the IMF projects Saudi Arabia’s economy to contract by 3.3 per cent this year, then grow by 7.9 per cent next year. The UAE is forecast to expand by 7.7 per cent next year. Such a rebound can create real openings for business, but it should not be read as a smooth or guaranteed rise in demand: growth after a contraction may partly reflect recovery from a lower base.

That distinction matters well beyond the Gulf. World trade volume is projected to grow by 4.6 per cent this year and 4.7 per cent next year, after 5.0 per cent last year. For businesses, the message is to identify which markets and sectors are actually generating demand, rather than treat “emerging markets” as one opportunity. For investors, headline growth in gross domestic product is only a starting point: returns depend on whether it feeds into company revenues and profits, and on the risks to costs, currencies and market access.

The opportunity now is to build on this shift: to invest in emerging markets, deepen commercial relationships and create new routes for trade, capital, technology and talent. The next phase of globalisation will not simply connect more countries to the same old centres. It will be shaped by networks that link new producers with new consumers and give businesses more ways to reach them. For companies, that means building local partnerships and distribution, adapting products to local demand, and developing the infrastructure and services that make these markets easier to serve.

The next decade could bring a historic expansion of prosperity: the rise of the rest alongside a prosperous West, with billions more people gaining access to better jobs, services and markets

Artificial intelligence could change the economics of that effort. It can help firms operate across distances, improve logistics, tailor services and raise productivity without first replicating every institution and capability built in older industrial economies. Used well, AI could allow countries to move faster from market growth to productive capacity, but technology will not deliver that outcome by itself. Reliable power and connectivity, skills, competition and sound rules will determine who can use it – and who captures the value it creates.

The next decade could bring a historic expansion of prosperity: the rise of the rest alongside a prosperous West, with billions more people gaining access to better jobs, services and markets. That outcome is possible, not promised. Economic weight has shifted, but prosperity still depends on choices: whether leaders invest in people and infrastructure, open routes for trade and ideas, and build institutions that give firms room to innovate and compete.

The defining question is no longer whether emerging economies will matter to the world economy. They already do. It is whether economic leadership and policy can turn their growing weight into durable productivity and broader prosperity. That will determine whether the next decade is remembered simply as the moment the world’s centre of gravity moved – or as the moment opportunity moved with it.