Download or read book Information and Modeling Issues in Designing Water and Sanitation Subsidy Schemes written by Vivien Foster and published by . This book was released on 2016 with total page 39 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Information and Modeling Issues in Designing Water and Sanitation Subsidy Schemes written by Andrés Gómez-Lobo and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2000 with total page 46 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Evaluating design alternatives is a first step in introducing optimal water subsidy schemes. The definition of appropriate targeting criteria and subsidy levels needs to be supported by empirical analysis, generally an informationally demanding exercise. An assessment carried out in Panama revealed that targeting individual households would be preferable to geographically based targeting. Empirical analysis also showed that only a small group of very poor households needed a subsidy to pay their water bill.
Download or read book Water Electricity and the Poor written by Kristin Komives and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2005 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book reviews the prevalence and variants of consumer subsidies found in the developing world and the effectiveness of these subsidies for the poor. It places consumer subsidies in a broader social protection framework and compares them with poverty-focused programmes in other sectors using a common metric. It concludes that the most common subsidy instruments perform poorly in comparison with most other transfer mechanisms. Alternative consumption and connection subsidy mechanisms show more promise, especially when combined with complementary non-price approaches to making utility services accessible and affordable to poor households. The many factors contributing to those outcomes are dissected, identifying those that can be controlled and used to improve performance.
Download or read book Public Private Partnerships for Urban Water Utilities written by Philippe Marin and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2009-09-22 with total page 204 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'Public-Private Partnerships for Urban Water Utilities: A Review of Experiences in Developing Countries' analyzes the market growth of Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) in the developing world since 1990, and the performance of more than 65 large water PPP projects representing more than 100 million people for access, service quality, operational efficiency, and tariff levels. Although a relatively small portion of the water utilities in the developing world are operated under PPPs (about 7 percent in 2007), the urban population served by private water operators has grown every year since 1990. Despite many difficulties encountered by PPP projects and a few contract terminations, a large majority of contracts awarded since 1990 are still in place. The track record for improving service and efficiency reaffirms the value of PPPs to help turn around poorly performing water utilities, even though the level of private financing did not match initial expectations. Over time, a more realistic market has developed, the number of private investors from developing countries has grown, and contract designs have become more pragmatic concerning risk allocations between partners. The water sector has many features that set it apart from other infrastructure sectors. This book suggests the need for careful consideration of those specificities to successfully involve private operators. Although concessions with private financing have worked in a few places, contractual arrangements that combine private operation with public financing appear to be the most sustainable option in many countries. Policy makers, stakeholders, and donors need to remain heavily engaged in the water sector, especially in the poorest countries and during a global financial crisis. This book contributes to a better understanding of the various options to tackle the many challenges of providing water and sanitation services to urban populations in the developing world.
Download or read book Taxing Issues with Privatization A Checklist written by and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2000 with total page 44 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Welfare Effects of Private Sector Participation in Guinea s Urban Water Supply written by George Clarke and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2000 with total page 46 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Private sector participation in Guinea's urban water sector has benefited consumers, the government, and, to a lesser extent, the new foreign owners. Performance will improve further when the government starts paying its own water bill on time and when the legislature authorizes the collection of unpaid bills from private consumers.
Download or read book Reforming Infrastructure written by Ioannis Nicolaos Kessides and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on with total page 325 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Electricity, natural gas, telecommunications, railways, and water supply, are often vertically and horizontally integrated state monopolies. This results in weak services, especially in developing and transition economies, and for poor people. Common problems include low productivity, high costs, bad quality, insufficient revenue, and investment shortfalls. Many countries over the past two decades have restructured, privatized and regulated their infrastructure. This report identifies the challenges involved in this massive policy redirection. It also assesses the outcomes of these changes, as well as their distributional consequences for poor households and other disadvantaged groups. It recommends directions for future reforms and research to improve infrastructure performance, identifying pricing policies that strike a balance between economic efficiency and social equity, suggesting rules governing access to bottleneck infrastructure facilities, and proposing ways to increase poor people's access to these crucial services.
Download or read book Multilateral Trade Liberalization and Political Disintegration written by Maurice W. Schiff and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2000 with total page 34 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Two theories are combined to explain why free trade areas have proliferated more than customs unions have.
Download or read book Leading Indicator Project Lithunia written by Stephen S. Everhart and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2000 with total page 22 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Abstract: June 2000 - A method for forecasting growth cycles in economic activity (measured as total industrial production), as applied to Lithuania. Everhart and Duval-Hernandez present a method for forecasting growth cycles in economic activity, measured as total industrial production. They construct a series which they aggregate into a composite leading indicator to predict the path of the economy in Lithuania. The cycle is the result of the economy's deviations from its long-term trend. A contractionary phase means a decline in the growth rate of the economy, not necessarily an absolute decline in economic activity. The indicator they select for economic activity is usually the Index of Industrial Production, plus a group of variables that, when filtered and adjusted, becomes the composite leading indicator that forecasts the reference series. Variables include economically and statistically significant financial, monetary, real sector, and business survey data. They base selection of the components of the leading indicator on the forecast efficiency and economic significance of the series. Once selected, the relevant variables are aggregated into a single composite leading indicator, which forecasts the detrended Index of Industrial Production. They apply the Hodrick-Prescott filter method for detrending the series. This is a smoothing technique that decomposes seasonally adjusted series into cyclical and trend components. One advantage of the Hodrick-Prescott filter is that it provides a reasonable estimate of a series' long-term trend. The OECD uses a system of leading indicators to predict growth cycles in the economies of its member countries. These exercises have been very effective in their forecasting ability and accuracy - but for the technique to work it is essential to have an adequate statistical system that provides many economic variables in a precise and timely manner, preferably monthly. The authors extend the OECD technique and present an application to a country of the former Soviet Union. This paper - a joint product of the Poverty Reduction and Economic Management Sector Units, Europe and Central Asia and Latin America and the Carribean Regions, and the Mexico Country Management Unit - is part of a larger effort in the Bank to foster the development of macroeconomic monitoring techniques. Authors may be contacted by email at [email protected] or [email protected].
Download or read book Perverse Effects of a Ratings related Capital Adequacy System written by Patrick Honohan and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2000 with total page 20 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It is important to harness market information to improve bank safety (for example, by increasing the role of large, well-informed, but uninsured claimants) but the approach of a ratings-related capital adequacy system could be counterproductive. Relying on ratings could induce borrowers to increase their exposure to systemic risk even if they reduce exposure to specific risk.
Download or read book Bureaucratic Delegation and Political Institutions written by Philip Keefer and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2000 with total page 54 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Does delegation of policymaking authority to independent agencies improve policy outcomes? This paper reports new theory and tests related to delegation of monetary policy to an independent central bank. The authors find that delegation reduces inflation only under specific institutional and political conditions.
Download or read book Would Collective Action Clauses Raise Borrowing Costs written by Barry Eichengreen and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2000 with total page 22 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Abstract: June 2000 - Collective action clauses raise borrowing costs for low-rated borrowers and lower them for high-rated borrowers. This result holds for all developing country bonds and also for the subset of sovereign bond issuers. It is easy to say that the International Monetary Fund should not resort to financial rescue for countries in crisis; this is hard to do when there is no alternative. That is where collective action clauses come in. Collective action clauses are designed to facilitate debt restructuring by the principals - borrowers and lenders - with minimal intervention by international financial institutions. Despite much discussion of this option, there has been little action. Issuers of bonds fear that collective action clauses would raise borrowing costs. Eichengreen and Mody update earlier findings about the impact of collective action clauses on borrowing costs. It has been argued that only in the past year or so have investors focused on the presence of these provisions and that, given the international financial institutions' newfound resolve to bail in investors, they now regard these clauses with trepidation. Extending their data to 1999, Eichengreen and Mody find no evidence of such changes but rather the same pattern as before: Collective action clauses raise the costs of borrowing for low-rated issuers but reduce them for issuers with good credit ratings. Their results hold both for the full set of bonds and for bonds issued only by sovereigns. They argue that these results should reassure those who regard collective action clauses as an important element in the campaign to strengthen international financial architecture. This paper - a product of the Development Prospects Group - is part of a larger effort in the group to analyze international capital flows. The study was funded by the Bank's Research Support Budget under the research project Pricing of Bonds and Bank Loans in the Market for Developing Country Debt. The authors may be contacted at eichengr@@econ.berkeley.edu or amody@@worldbank.org.
Download or read book Environmental Policy and Time Consistency written by Peter William Kennedy and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2000 with total page 48 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As instruments for controlling pollution, how do emissions taxes and emissions trading compare in terms of the incentives they create to adopt cleaner technologies? Emissions taxes may have a slight advantage over emissions trading.
Download or read book Evaluating Carbon Offsets from Forestry and Energy Projects written by Kenneth M. Chomitz and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2000 with total page 34 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Under the clean development mechanism, developing countries will be able to produce certified emissions reductions (CERs, sometimes called "offsets") through projects that reduce greenhouse gas emissions below business-as-usual levels. The challenges of setting up offset markets are considerable. Do forestry projects, as a class, have more difficulty than energy projects reducing greenhouse gas emissions in ways that are real, measurable, additional, and consistent with sustainable development?
Download or read book Why Infrastructure Financing Facilities Often Fall Short of Their Objectives written by Daniela Klingebiel and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2000 with total page 46 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: To encourage the private funding and provision of infrastructure services, governments have used specialized financing facilities to offer financial support to investors. A study of five cases shows that these facilities have often fallen short of their objectives, for two main sets of reasons. First, the environment was not conducive to private participation in infrastructure. And second, the facility was faulty in design.
Download or read book Trade foreign direct investment and international technology transfer a survey written by Kamal Saggi and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2000 with total page 50 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Abstract: May 2000 - How much a developing country can take advantage of technology transfer from foreign direct investment depends partly on how well educated and well trained its workforce is, how much it is willing to invest in research and development, and how much protection it offers for intellectual property rights. Saggi surveys the literature on trade and foreign direct investment - especially wholly owned subsidiaries of multinational firms and international joint ventures - as channels for technology transfer. He also discusses licensing and other arm's-length channels of technology transfer. He concludes: How trade encourages growth depends on whether knowledge spillover is national or international. Spillover is more likely to be national for developing countries than for industrial countries; Local policy often makes pure foreign direct investment infeasible, so foreign firms choose licensing or joint ventures. The jury is still out on whether licensing or joint ventures lead to more learning by local firms; Policies designed to attract foreign direct investment are proliferating. Several plant-level studies have failed to find positive spillover from foreign direct investment to firms competing directly with subsidiaries of multinationals. (However, these studies treat foreign direct investment as exogenous and assume spillover to be horizontal - when it may be vertical.) All such studies do find the subsidiaries of multinationals to be more productive than domestic firms, so foreign direct investment does result in host countries using resources more effectively; Absorptive capacity in the host country is essential for getting significant benefits from foreign direct investment. Without adequate human capital or investments in research and development, spillover fails to materialize; A country's policy on protection of intellectual property rights affects the type of industry it attracts. Firms for which such rights are crucial (such as pharmaceutical firms) are unlikely to invest directly in countries where such protections are weak, or will not invest in manufacturing and research and development activities. Policy on intellectual property rights also influences whether technology transfer comes through licensing, joint ventures, or the establishment of wholly owned subsidiaries. This paper - a product of Trade, Development Research Group - is part of a larger effort in the group to study microfoundations of international technology diffusion. The study was funded by the Bank's Research Support Budget under the research project Microfoundations of International Technology Diffusion. The author may be contacted at [email protected].
Download or read book The Middle Class Consensus and Economic Development written by William Easterly and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2000 with total page 48 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A higher share of income for the middle class and lower ethnic polarization are empirically associated with higher income, higher growth, more education, better health, better infrastructure, better economic policies, less political instability, less civil war (putting ethnic minorities at risk), more social "modernization," and more democracy.
