With economic growth stalling — or in some cases plummeting — in many of the world’s developing countries, foreign direct investment appears to be following suit. In times of economic uncertainty, companies tend to seek out safe havens and will forfeit the growth opportunities that emerging markets present if these markets start to look unstable or sluggish. There are early signs that this trend could be at work.

According to figures from fDi Markets, an FT data service, 97 of 154 countries typically classed as emerging markets have experienced declines in capital expenditure on greenfield investment projects in the first six months of this year compared with the same time period last year. (Eleven of the 154 countries did not have verifiable greenfield projects recorded last year so were excluded from the comparison.)

In 25 of the 97 countries showing negative growth, capital expenditure collapsed to zero. Another 42 saw dramatic declines of 50 per cent or more; a further 22 saw drops of between 20 and 50 per cent between January-June 2014 and January-June 2015.