I am pleased to join the Chairman in welcoming you to this 19th Annual Meeting of the Board of Governors of the Asian Develop- ment Bank. First, I would like to thank President Aquino for her thought-provoking address, and assure her that her Government will have the cooperation and support of the Asian Development Bank.
I should like to welcome to this meeting the Governor for Spain, which became the 46th member of the ADB in February, and the Governor for the People's Republic of China which became the 47th member in March. The Bank looks forward to the contributions that both of these countries will make.
The state of the Asian-Pacific economy and of ADB operations during 1985 are fully described in the Annual Report of the Bank. I would like, however, to highlight a few of the more important features of the present economic situation, to briefly review Bank operations and then to share with you my view on the impact these will have on the Bank's future.
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I. Economic Setting
Last year, many of the Bank's developing member countries faced severe economic dif- ficulties. The average GDP growth of our developing member countries was only 3.6 per
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