MANILA, July 2 (Xinhua) -- Asian countries should continue to carry out expansionary fiscal and monetary policies to foster growth and it is not the time to discuss exit strategies, said chief economist of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) on Thursday.

    Asian economies showed mild signs of recovery after governments implemented big-size fiscal stimulus packages in time to prevent the worst spill-over of the global financial crisis.

    Discussion of exit strategies gained steam as the economy started to bottom out. Economists feared that the unusual monetary and fiscal expansion measures could lead to record high inflation when the world's economy stabilizes.

    ADB Chief Economist Jong-Wha Lee told reporters in the ADB headquarters here that current recovery taking shape in the region is weak and many Asian countries are still in their worst situation in terms of economic growth since the World War II.

    "The recovery is not that strong," Jong-Wha Lee said, "so governments should not kill the growth over inflation concerns."

    Jong-Wha said measures to ease the inflationary pressure should only be implemented when a sustained growth is seen.

    The ADB in March forecasted the economic growth for developing Asia to plunge to 3.4 percent in 2009 and climb up to 6 percent next year.

    Lee said Asian government should continue the monetary and fiscal expansion until the sustained growth is achieved, while at the same time watching out for the accumulating inflationary pressure.

    He cited China as a good example, saying that even though the government implemented its massive 4-trillion-yuan (586 billion U.S. dollars) stimulus, the inflationary pressure remains low. The consumer prices index, the key barometer of the inflation, was down 1.5 percent in May compared with the same period last year and even declined by 0.3 percent from this April, the official statistics showed.

    "It is never too early to prepare for the inflation, but now it is not the time to implement such mitigation measures," Lee said. "Compared to the industrialized countries, inflationary pressure is not so great."

Special Report:  Global Financial Crisis