The Changing trends In Foreign Direct Investment
Before World War II, foreign direct investment has been in a secondary position in international capital flows, loan capital and securities investment was the main mode of international investment. Since 1950s, multinational corporations and foreign direct investment have a rapid development and attracted a universal concern in the western scholars. Many theory giving the explain the behaviour of FDI came out, such as the monopolistic advantage theory, the international product cycle theory, the theory of oligopoly behaviour and so on (Globerman, 1997).
Table 1, Foreign Direct Investment
| (100Â million USD) | ||||||
| Country or Area |
FDI Inflows |
FDI Outflows |
||||
| 2000 | 2006 | 2007 | 2000 | 2006 | 2007 | |
| World | 13981.83 | 14110.18 | 18333.24 | 12316.39 | 13231.50 | 19965.1 |
| China | 407.15 | 727.15 | 835.21 | 9.16 | 211.60 | 224.69 |
| India | 35.85 | 196.62 | 229.50 | 5.09 | 128.42 | 136.49 |
| Japan | 83.23 | -65.06 | 225.49 | 315.58 | 502.66 | 735.49 |
| Korea, Rep. | 90.04 | 48.81 | 26.28 | 49.99 | 81.27 | 152.76 |
| Canada | 667.95 | 627.65 | 1086.55 | 446.79 | 391.17 | 538.18 |
| United States | 3139.97 | 2367.19 | 2328.65 | 1426.26 | 2216.64 | 3137.87 |
| Germany | 1982.77 | 551.71 | 509.25 | 565.57 | 947.05 | 1674.31 |
| United Kingdom | 1187.64 | 1481.89 | 2239.66 | 2333.71 | 867.64 | 2657.91 |
| Australia | 139.63 | 257.36 | 222.66 | 31.61 | 226.38 | 242.09 |
Source: UNCTAD Database.
Table 1 shows the changes of foreign direct investment from 2000 to 2007 among the main countries in the world. It indicates that the foreign direct investment increased year by year. United States, Germany and UK are the main countries no matter in FDI inflows or FDI out flows. And these countries are all developed countries. However, although FDI in developing growing fast, it still take a little proportion of FDI in the world.
