Malaysian Fisheries Department director-general Datuk Ahamad Sabki Mahmood has been enthusing about his country's untapped fishing reserves. Apparently research has revealed that Malaysia possesses bountiful resources off the coasts of Sarawak and Sabah. These will allow a yield of 500,000 tonnes of fish by 2020, a harvesting that the director-general added could be easily sustained provided all those concerned stuck to the parameters of their fishing licenses.

Ahamad added that the breeding grounds for commercial fish would not be affected, avoiding the depletion that had devastated fishing stocks in other parts of the globe. Within Malaysia's coastal waters were areas which enjoyed exclusive economic zone status. This included the seas off the coast of Labuan where the stocks of tuna and other pelagic fish were flourishing after being relatively untouched for numbers of years.

Those deep-sea fishing companies who had proved to be most sensitive to the needs to maintain regularly replenished fishing stock would be granted rights to continue well-managed fishing enterprises.

This would encourage these companies to continue to make bigger investments. This commitment would be reciprocated by the Malaysian authorities who would maintain close ties with the fishing fleets when the time came to renew seasonal permits. In this way, fishing catches would be optimized, with some 12 anchor companies receiving appointment certificates at the Malaysian Fisheries Department's HQ in Wisma Tani.

According to figures collated by his department, Ahamad stated that the 2012 harvest accounted for 1.4 million tonnes of fish, valued at RM 7.9 million. Of this total, just over 325,000 tonnes were trapped by deep-sea fishing vessels.

"The landing of deep-sea fish is crucial in meeting the increasing protein demand as an alternative to fish supply from shallower waters which has been optimised."

Malaysia is currently managing a fishing fleet of 1,350 fully-licensed deep-sea vessels. This marks a massive rise in the comparable figures from the tail end of the 1980s, which still at a mere 260.

The fishing authorities selected those companies most likely to capitalize on Malaysia's bountiful resources by comparing success rates at entrapping deep sea fish. Those catching in excess of 80% could expect to be prioritized during the allocation of permits, as maintaining this level of harvesting success was not a straightforward task.

Asia's top 5 financial trends

Towards the end of 2008, the major economies of the West began to falter, and by the turn of the year, recession had started to bite. While this was particularly pronounced in Europe, the key players on the Asian economic stage – China, Japan and India – managed to maintain a relatively even keel. However, just as the European economies are starting a sluggish fight back towards healthier market conditions, the impact of those previous years of fiscal uncertainty has at last been having an impact in the East.

Asian money is tightening, with credit agencies putting the squeeze on personal and commercial finance. The scale of economic growth, which had previously enjoyed considerable periods of stability, has slumped to moderate levels. Property prices are tumbling.

For all that, the Asian economy still represents one of the true growth regions in the globe.

The International Monetary Fund and Asian Development Bank still forecast a GDP standing at around seven percent. As well as this, here are the five other main trends forecast to be affecting Asian economies:-

1. Property Prices will continue to fall, although there is unlikely to be a decline as sharp as the US markets experienced. Inflation tempering in China will cause their property market to be less buoyant than 2011.

2. Global acquisitions Asian companies will continue to expand into global markets. The power of the yen will inevitably lead to Japan leading the eastern pack. In 2011 that country became the region's largest acquirer of foreign assets. As hundreds of trillions of Japanese yen become valued at their highest levels to the dollar since 1945, this spending spree is likely to continue.

3. Yuan conversion China will be trying to ensure that the yuan becomes a convertible currency. The recent trend of Hong Kong companies raising collateral by issuing debt in yuan (as an attempt to fund expansions into markets in the People's Republic) will continue unabated. Around the world central banks may well start incorporating the Chinese yuan as an important component of their foreign-exchange reserves.

4. Hiring employees Although there will be redundancies throughout Europe and the US as part of budget tightening, Asian companies look set to buck this trend. In fact, recent market research has gone as far as to anticipate workforce expansions of more than 5 percent.

5. Credit tightening Asian banks will tighten their lending criteria in order to curb excessive financing. This will have a knock-on effect with small businesses, curtailing their ability to raise capital. Beijing's has been trying to counter the need for such drastic control by stimulating their economy through tax cuts for small businesses and increasing public service spending.

According to the Asian Development Bank, weak export demand from major industrial economies and China will continue to bring down economic growth throughout many regions in Asia next year.

Asia's economies –excluding Japan- will grow 6% this year and 6.6% in 2013, said ADB. Both figures are 0.1 percentage point lower than forecasted in October.

ADB Chief Economist Changyong Rhee said: “Enduring debt problems and economic weakness in Europe and the looming fiscal in the United States remain very real threats to developing Asia next year”.

While India, South Korea and the two largest Central Asian and Caucasus economies –Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan- have experience an surprising slower growth, other economies, such as the Philippines and Malaysia, have seen a more rapid expansion.

As China's industrial production bounced back, its economy should expand as forecasted, which is 7.7% in 2012 and 8.1% in 2013, ADB said.

East Asian economies continue to be pulled down by weak external demand from industrial nations and China. Consequently, the ADB revised growth prospects for the region, which went down by 0.1% (from 6.5% to 6.4% in 2012; and from 7.1% to 7% in 2013).

Similarly, South Korea experienced its slowest growth since the third quarter of 2009, as it grew 1.6% in the third quarter from a year ago.

General growth in Southeast Asia may hit 5.3% in 2012 and 5.5% in 2013. The top five regional economies –Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand and the Philippines- will grow 5.9% in 2012 and 5.8% next year.

Hong Kong's government plans to raise the city's minimum wage by 7.1% as a measure to help citizens squeezed by inflation and the world's highest home prices. This is the first increase of the minimum wage since it was introduced on May 2011, benefitting around 10% of the working population. The minimum hourly wage will go from HK$28 ($3.60; £2.18) to HK$30 on May 1, 2013, stated Labor Secretary Matthew Cheung.

This proposal is part of Chief Executive Leung Chen-ying's efforts to tackle Asia's biggest wealth gap, after being buffeted by student protests and low popularity since taking office on July 1. While the division between the poor and the rich widened to its worst since at least 1971, inflation jumped to 5.3% last year, and may be 3.9% this year.

The initiative will boost the wages of about 327,200 employees, or 10% of the city's workers, according to an earlier report by a government commission. “The income of employees at grass-root level has shown a significant improvement since the minimum-wage policy was carried out last year,” Cheung said. “The proposed increase is reasonable and balanced.”

Likewise, an economist at Australia & New Zealand Banking Group Ltd. (ANZ), Raymond Yeung, stated that a 7.1% increase over two years is reasonable.

112,000 people took the streets the day Leung took over, July 1 –which is also the 15th anniversary of Hong Kong's handover to China. The causes of the protests included minimum wages, income disparities and human right abuses in the country.

The segment of the population at the lower end of the income spectrum increasingly struggle with sky-high property prices and a dramatic escalation in the costs of living. The average gross household income of the poorest 10% of the population fell 16% to HK$2,170 a month in 2011 in the last decade. In contrast, the comparable income of the richest 10% jumped to HK$137,480 a month, a 12% increase.

Home prices in Hong Kong have rocketed to become the world's most expensive, propelled by record low interest rates and an influx of mainland Chinese buyers. As a response to this situation, the government imposed a 15% tax on foreign home buyers and increased a re-sale duty.