Search results for "developing"
showing 10 items of 417 documents
A Fourfold Justification of Common Industrial Policy
2021
Most industries need wider regions to flourish. Conversely, most regions need some industries to grow; few can live on agriculture or services alone. However, the interplay of industries and regions is not yet sufficiently developed in African economic practice. This chapter develops a fourfold technical argument for common industrial policy (CIP) in African RECs. Part of the argument is that African RECs already engage in such joint policies, but under different names and not in the required sequence. The opportunity for a regional union to act as a lock-in mechanism for such structural policies is also discussed. Up until now, advanced economy RECs have viewed CIP as a third-rank policy a…
Banking Crises and Short and Medium Term Output Losses in Emerging and Developing Countries: The Role of Structural and Policy Variables
2012
The aim of this paper is to assess the dynamic impact of banking crises on output for a panel of developing economies. Using an unbalanced panel of 159 countries from 1970 to 2006, the paper shows that banking crises produce significant output losses. Output losses are larger for relatively richer economies, characterized by a higher level of financial deepening and larger current account imbalances. Flexible exchange rates, fiscal and monetary policy, and liquidity support policies have been found to attenuate the effect of the crises. © 2012 Elsevier Ltd.
The macroeconomic effects of electricity-sector privatization
2021
Abstract We examine the macroeconomic effects of privatizing the ownership structure of the electricity market, using a novel indicator of privatization which covers 90 advanced, emerging market, and developing economies, since 1974. Privatization reforms, on average, improve outcomes in the provision of electricity and have positive macroeconomic effects: output and employment increase in the years following electricity-sector privatization reforms. Reforms are also associated also with an increase in income inequality, but the effects are small, on average. These impacts vary according to the business cycle, quality of institutions, and a country's development status, with macroeconomic a…
Do Multinationals Deteriorate Developing Countries' Export Prices? The Impact of FDI on Net Barter Terms of Trade
2015
This paper explores the economic relationship between foreign direct investment (FDI) to developing countries and the export prices of the latter, measured by terms of trade. It is rst shown that economic theory suggests such a relationship for various reasons but is inconclusive about the direction of the eect. To address this open issue empirically, I analyze data on more than 50 developing countries throughout the period 1980 - 2008 using robust dynamic panel data methods. The results show that FDI had an economically relevant and statistically signicant positive impact on developing countries’ net barter terms of trade. A higher level of education in the developing country fosters this …
Bilateral De-Jure Exchange Rate Regimes and Foreign Direct Investment: A Gravity Analysis
2021
Abstract This paper introduces a novel dataset on bilateral de-jure exchange rate regimes. The new dataset accounts for the fact that officially pegging to one currency is uninformative about the exchange rate regime prevailing vis-a-vis other currencies, and it allows characterizing bilateral exchange rate regimes based on countries’ ex-ante announcements rather than ex-post observations. We use this data to estimate the effect of expected exchange rate volatility on foreign direct investment (FDI). Starting from a simple model that suggests that announced exchange rate stability enhances bilateral FDI flows, we provide empirical evidence that lends support to this claim: countries that ar…
Is external debt sustainable? A probabilistic approach
2020
Abstract We develop a probabilistic approach to measure a country's external debt sustainability. Using data on international investment position and balance of payments from the International Monetary Fund, we estimate a vector autoregressive model for 38 countries (11 developed and 27 developing). Using the estimated parameters, we perform a Monte Carlo simulation to compute the distribution of the capacity to repay for each country. A large portion of the projected distribution to the right of current debt is a warning indicator, signalling the need for devaluation. We provide simulations for each country. One scenario is where the discount factor is lower than 1. According to the litera…
Expanding education through user charges : what can be achieved in Malawi and other LDCs ?
1986
International audience; Two features mark the education sector in many LDCs today: first, education is publicly provided; and second. governments are faced with severe financial constraints. As a result, enrollmrnts are confined to low Ievels, and there is excess demand. To mitigate these adverse outcomes, we consider user charges as a means to mobilize additional resources for education. Under the circumstances that characterize most LDCs. we show that (i) families are willing to pay for education: (ii) the resources collected through user charges could finance a sizable expansion of education; and (iii) scholarships can offset the equity effects of user charges.
Income Inequality and Technology Diffusion: Evidence from Developing Countries*
2011
We study the effect of within-country income inequality on the diffusion of mobile phones using data on market penetration in a sample of developing countries from 1985 to 1998. Mobile phones are an example of international technology, originating in industrialized countries and diffusing worldwide. We find that income inequality, as measured by the income share of the highest earning deciles, has a positive effect on the early diffusion of mobile phones and that the estimated effect becomes greater when a measure of agricultural endowments is used as an instrument. The instrumental variable results are robust to weak instruments. Our findings suggest that the diffusion of new technologies …
Student Learning in Public and Private Primary Schools in Madagascar
2003
03058; International audience; This article examines the progress of primary education in Madagascar. The challenge facing policy makers is enormous: how to maintain (or indeed, improve) learning across schools within Madagascar based on the data from the Conference des Ministries de l'Education des Pays Ayant le Francais en Partage in five African countries where common tests were administered to second- and fifth-graders. Beyond documenting the aggregate differences across sectors, the extent to which differences across schools, particularly between those in the public and private sectors, are associated with pupils' socioeconomic background, difference sin school inputs, and gaps across …
TERRORISM AND INTERNATIONAL TOURISM: NEW EVIDENCE
2008
This paper analyses the impact of terrorist activity on international tourist flows. To this end, we have estimated a cross‐sectional gravity equation for tourism from the G‐7 countries to a sample of 134 destinations over the period 2001–2003. Within this framework, we evaluate the deviation from ‘normal’ tourist flows due to terrorist activity, which is considered as negative advertising for the affected country. The analysis suggests that both domestic victims and international attacks are relevant factors when foreign tourists make their choice. This result is robust under alternative specifications. Moreover, the impact of terrorism is more severe in developing countries. The author is…