Singapore launched a government agency called Infrastructure Asia on Tuesday to support infrastructure projects across the region, which need billions of dollars in funding, and make them more appealing to financial institutions and private investors, Reuters reports. The move is seen as an attempt to counter China’s spreading influence through its Belt and Road initiative. Previously, Australia, the United States, India and Japan are talking about establishing a joint regional infrastructure scheme as an alternative to BRI. The Asian Development Bank estimates developing economies in Asia will need to invest about US$26 trillion in infrastructure projects until 2030, or US$1.7 trillion a year. Currently only about US$880 billion is being spent annually, according to Singapore’s second minister for finance Indranee Rajah, as quoted by Bloomberg.