The ability to recruit a large new group of Western lenders (e.g. securities firms, pension funds, insurance companies, corporations and even individuals).

CENTERFORSECURITYPOLICY: Center For Security Policy

"This looks like a philosophical essay, " wrote Lawrence Krauss, a professor of physics at Case-Western Reserve University, in an e-mail.

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International e-commerce growth should exceed that of Western economies.

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These include charging western users a small fee for sending a certain number of e-mails over the net.

BBC: Developing nations want better net access

Since the 1980's, emerging market economies, like those of China and Russia, have become increasingly sophisticated in the way they finance their respective governments and affiliated companies -- transitioning from reliance on syndicated commercial bank loans and Western government funding vehicles to the private capital markets (i.e. the issuance of stocks and bonds).

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Western Europe's employees are also better wired: every new member-state is below the western average for internet penetration, and all but Estonia and Slovenia trail on e-government scores.

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And China's internet start-ups, such as Tencent (a social-networking service) and Alibaba (an e-commerce company), have had a genius for copying Western business models and adapting them to the Chinese market.

ECONOMIST: Innovation in China

Although Asian consumers are ill-prepared for e-commerce, its businesses stand to gain far more than their western counterparts.

ECONOMIST: E-commerce

Last fall, one child died and more than 60 people in the Western United States and Canada became sick after drinking unpasteurized Odwalla apple juice that was contaminated with the E. coli bacteria.

CNN: FDA to make juices safer from E. coli