Rapid export growth has been the hallmark of East Asia‘s rise in the global economy. The combined share of East Asian countries in world non-oil exports recorded a three-
fold increase, from 11% to 33%, between 1969/70 and 2006/7.4 The region accounted for over 40% of the total increase in world exports over this period. In the 1970s and 1980s, Japan dominated the region‘s trade, accounting for nearly 60% of exports and imports.