New Delhi, December 11:

Indian prime minister Manmohan Singh today said while there were ample studies on the benefits of free movement of goods and investment, the same was not true for professionals where India has an edge.

“There are many questions pertaining to the globalisation of lifestyles and its consequences for consumption, and their impact on the world environment,” he said at the London School of Economics Asia Forum. “If every consumer in India and in China, totalling up to almost three billion, want to live like people in San Francisco, Stockholm or Singapore, can they afford to? Can nature afford it?” According to him, the rise of Asia will be the most important development of this century and alter the balance of world income to present both opportunities and challenges.