The Asians are coming - and the dating game is very serious

BEWARE! Asia is coming. That was the core message from a presentation at last week's Irish Management Institute Conference in Wicklow, given by former Financial Times journalist turned professional 'thinker' and writer Charles Leadbetter.

One of the things that made his dire warnings about the rise of Asian economies so interesting was that it began with a different premise to previous predictions of doom and gloom.

Most warnings in recent years about the rise of China and India have focused on how these lower cost economies will continue to hoover up manufacturing jobs.

To some extent, it has almost become an accepted fact that the level of manufacturing conducted in the EU, and in places like Ireland in particular, will continue to fall, as companies move production east.

Mr Leadbetter went a lot further last week by saying that we know the so-called low-skill, low-paid jobs are going to go east, but even the high-skill, high-paid, research and innovation jobs look set to go there as well.

This dismal prediction was explored to its logical end by Leadbetter who said in a worst case scenario, the middle classes of Western Europe may find that their education and training will no longer be a guarantee of wealth or success. In other words, large chunks of the middle classes will be wiped out in the West.

His reasoning was based on facts which show the number of Chinese and Indian undergraduates reaching massive levels. India has so many computer engineers and China will have zillions in a few years time.

He also gave examples of research and development centres in Korea and India which he had visited and they would, according to Mr Leadbetter, put us to shame.

The other big trend in Asia is that the previous pattern of emigration from places like India is now being reversed.

Highly experienced engineers and software specialists, having spent their few years in the US or Britain, were now returning to Bangalore or Delhi and setting up businesses for themselves - or joining growing indigenous companies.

It is a scary prospect, given the scale of these economies and the difference in the cost of doing business there.

However, after giving everybody a good shock, Mr Leadbetter then inserted these caveats to the success of Asia: quantity doesn't always mean quality; having zillions of university graduates isn't such a threat if standards are not very high.

Either way, he did put up a credible scenario which would seriously undermine one of the mainstays of Irish industrial and economic strategy for the future. IDA Ireland and, to a lesser extent, Enterprise Ireland know only too well that manufacturing jobs are going east. According to them, Ireland will assert itself by going after quality, highly skilled research jobs. The proverbial 'knowledge economy'.

Mr Leadbetter is saying we can't take for granted the idea that Asian economies will simply let us carve things up in that way. They want those jobs too.

Complacency is the problem. In Ireland we have certain things going for us. One of them is the fact that our economy has already moved beyond traditional manufacturing, or was never really in it in the first place.

Compare our relatively flexible economic model to Italy, which is facing huge economic pain into the future as manufacturing jobs go east by the hundreds of thousands; or France, where developing the ability to fire people leads to protests on the streets.

To some extent at this point in time Ireland is fighting fit. Hence our projected economic growth of 6pc and our current wealth. But the future poses problems. Decisions have to be made now which will allow us to plan for that future.

A complete re-think on education is one of them. The limits of the points system, the need to reward innovation by incentivising people to invest in it, the rigid association of school and education, are all things that need to be looked at.

Government has a huge role to play in all of this. One of the trickiest issues is figuring out how to deal with the developing East. When do they cease to be competitors and become potential collaborators? Do we opt for co-operation or rivalry?

Certainly the consensus at a panel discussion on the topic at the IMI last week was that we need to find ways of co-operating. Everything was mentioned, from twinning Irish towns and cities with their equivalents in Asia, to attracting Chinese, Indian and Korean specialists.

In economic terms, as a nation we are now 'married to the EU'. We are still on talking terms with our first wife, the UK. We have more than 'a bit on the side' with the US. It's time to get past a first date with Asia.