More than two-thirds of companies polled for the latest Unctad World Investment Prospects Survey planned to increase their FDI expenditures each year between 2007 and 2009.

Results were based on 192 respondents among the largest transnational corporations in the world.

Unctad said it expected FDI to increase across practically all sectors and home countries due to continued world economic growth, high profitability, and the availability of external finance. Greenfield investments (the new establishment of affiliates in foreign countries) would be more commonly used as an entry mode into developing economies, it said, while investment in developed countries would more frequently take the form of mergers and acquisitions.

Almost half of respondents said they planned further overseas expansion of research and development operations.