New York: McDonald's, the world's largest restaurant company, may boost investment in Asia by at least 20 per cent this year as consumer spending recovers, moving into "beef eater" markets such as South Korea.

The seller of Big Macs will invest $415 million (Dh1.52 billion) in Asia, the Middle East and Africa this year to add 520 restaurants, Tim Fenton, head of the chain's regional business, said in an interview in Hong Kong. Spending in the region was about $350 million in 2009, he said.

"McDonald's is really the only company with the best portfolio of markets around the world," Joel Silverstein, president of Hong Kong-based restaurant consultant East West Hospitality Group, said in a phone interview. "In Asia, they are still growing."

Oak Brook, Illinois-based McDonald's last year generated 19 per cent of its sales from the region, an increase from 18 per cent in 2008 and 15.8 per cent in 2007. Sales from the Asia Pacific, Middle East and Africa increased 2.5 per cent in 2009, compared with declines in the US and Europe, as rising incomes in China drove consumer spending and diners in Japan and developed countries chose less-expensive meals.

McDonald's may "aggressively start expansion" in South Korea, where comparable sales growth has been "double-digit" in the past four years, Fenton said in the interview, which took place March 26. The company operates 227 outlets in the country.

"Korea is a big market for us: you've got 48 million people, a $30,000 average household income and beef eaters," Fenton said. McDonald's plans to invest $15 million in the country this year, and twice that in 2011, he said.

McDonald's rose 0.5 per cent to $67.26 in New York trading on March 26, boosting its gain this year to 7.7 per cent.

"Asia Pac is growing faster than any other area of the world, faster than the US, faster than Europe," said Fenton. "China is a numbers game too, look at the population, the evolution and the growth of the middle class."

Breakdown

The region's same-store or comparable sales, which strip out the effects of newly opened outlets, rose 10.5 per cent in February, compared with 4.8 per cent globally, Fenton said, declining to give a breakdown by country. China is the fastest-growing market globally for McDonald's, he said.

The restaurant chain operates 8,482 restaurants in the region. This year, the company plans to add as many as 175 in China, 100 in Japan, 65 in the Middle East, 40 in Australia, 17 in Malaysia and 14 in Korea and the rest in India and Africa, he said in the interview, which took place March 26.

McDonald's will add 200 outlets, the biggest addition on a global scale, in China next year, and aims to have 2,000 in the nation by 2015, Fenton said. The company, which opened its first restaurant in Shenzhen in 1990, now has 1,146 stores in the world's third-largest economy.

"It took us 19 years to get to 1,000 and it'll take us six more years to get to 2,000," Fenton said. In pursuit of this goal, it's accelerating its franchising programme to add to the six independently owned restaurants it now has there, he said.