Download or read book Unlocking Sustainable Private Sector Growth in the Middle East and North Africa written by European Investment Bank and published by European Investment Bank. This book was released on 2022-06-09 with total page 137 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: More than a decade after the Arab Spring, the Middle East and North Africa region finds itself facing momentous challenges. The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted economies, and the Russian invasion of Ukraine sent shockwaves through the region, with higher hydrocarbon prices, risks to food security and a drop in tourism. Beyond looms the threat of climate change. But challenging times provide opportunities for change. The region's private sector can seize the moment. It remains the hope for many young people and has the potential to drive a sustainable model of growth. The Enterprise Surveys, conducted by the EIB, EBRD and the World Bank, provide insight into what lies beneath the region's relatively slow growth, with a focus on the reasons for stagnating productivity and inadequate accumulation of human and physical capital in the private sector.

Download or read book Unlocking Sustainable Private Sector Growth in the Middle East and North Africa written by and published by . This book was released on 2022 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Surveys of nearly 6 000 businesses in Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Tunisia and the West Bank and Gaza shed light on the state of the private sector in the Middle East and North Africa. More than a decade after the Arab Spring, the Middle East and North Africa region finds itself facing momentous challenges. The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted economies, and the Russian invasion of Ukraine sent shockwaves through the region, with higher hydrocarbon prices, risks to food security and a drop in tourism. Beyond looms the threat of climate change. But challenging times provide opportunities for change. The region's private sector can seize the moment. It remains the hope for many young people and has the potential to drive a sustainable model of growth. The Enterprise Surveys, conducted by the EIB, EBRD and the World Bank, provide insight into what lies beneath the region's relatively slow growth, with a focus on the reasons for stagnating productivity and inadequate accumulation of human and physical capital in the private sector.

Download or read book EIB Global Report 2022 2023 The impact written by European Investment Bank and published by European Investment Bank. This book was released on 2023-06-08 with total page 108 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Building on decades of experience working in Europe's neighbourhood, in Africa and around the world, under EU mandates and in support of EU policy priorities, EIB Global brings together all the financial, engineering and scientific expertise of the European Investment Bank to maximise impact. The new structure fosters strong, focused partnerships within Team Europe, with multilateral development banks and bilateral development agencies. With a stronger presence on the ground, it increases our cooperation with partner countries, clients, EU Member States and other development finance institutions. This publication reports on the first year of EIB Global. The first section reviews the development context, looking at global macroeconomic development and the different regions where EIB Global operates: EU neighbourhood countries sub-Saharan Africa the Western Balkans and Türkiye Asia and the Pacific, and Latin America and the Caribbean The report then turns to the overarching priorities of EIB Global and the European Fund for Sustainable Development Plus, examining investment needs and describing the response by EIB Global: Climate change Jobs and inclusive growth The Global Gateway The final part brings together all the information on the results and impact of EIB Global operations and the financial and non-financial contribution we make. It covers: How we measure results and impact Expected results of new projects EIB Global's contribution to new projects Evidence on the EIB's crowding-in effect Carbon footprint exercise Macroeconomic impact modelling Results of completed projects Lending volumes List of operations signed in 2022 A companion volume to this report, EIB Global Report: The Story, delves deeper into the rationale for, and experience gained from, individual EIB Global projects.

Download or read book Unlocking Africa s Business Potential written by Landry Signe and published by Brookings Institution Press. This book was released on 2020-04-07 with total page 361 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Africa welcomes business investment and offers some of the world's highest returns and impacts Africa has tremendous economic potential and offers rewarding opportunities for global businesses looking for new markets and long-term investments with favorable returns. Africa has been one of the world's fastest-growing regions over the past decade, and by 2030 will be home to nearly 1.7 billion people and an estimated $6.7 trillion worth of consumer and business spending. Increased political stability in recent years and improving regional integration are making market access easier, and business expansion will generate jobs for women and youth, who represent the vast majority of the population. Current economic growth and poverty-alleviation efforts mean that more than 43 percent of the continent's people will reach middle- or upper-class status by 2030. Unlocking Africa's Business Potential examines business opportunities in the eight sectors with the highest potential returns on private investment—the same sectors that will foster economic growth and diversification, job creation, and improved general welfare. These sectors include: consumer markets, agriculture and agriprocessing, information and communication technology, manufacturing, oil and gas, tourism, banking, and infrastructure and construction. The book's analysis of these sectors is based on case studies that identify specific opportunities for investment and growth, along with long-term market projections to inform decision-making. The book identifies potential risks to business and offers mitigation strategies. It also provides policymakers with solutions to attract new business investments, including how to remove barriers to business and accelerate development of the private sector.

Download or read book Informality and Inclusive Growth in the Middle East and North Africa written by Gladys Lopez-Acevedo and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2023-06-30 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The long-standing informality debate in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) Region has taken on a new urgency as it looks for a pathway to more socially inclusive growth that is less reliant on fossil fuels. This is occurring against a backdrop of subpar labor market outcomes, further growth setbacks, and deteriorating fiscal and current account deficits in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic--and in the wake of high inflation and supply chain disruptions triggered by the Russian Federation-Ukraine war. 'Informality and Inclusive Growth in the Middle East and North Africa' aims to better understand the characteristics and incentive structure that have led to the prevalence of informal employment in three MENA countries--the Arab Republic of Egypt, Morocco, and Tunisia. The report breaks new ground by adopting a comprehensive perspective to focus on the features of, and interrelationships among, different aspects of these countries' institutional landscapes to make sense of the complex incentive structure that workers and firms face when deciding between formal and informal options. Specifically, the report groups these issues in three broad realms: (1) entrepreneur-worker relations, (2) taxes and transfers, and (3) market conditions. 'This report is an extremely welcome addition to the literature on MENA labor markets. By analyzing the incentive structure and institutional factors that have led to the prevalence of informal employment in Egypt, Morocco, and Tunisia, it points the way to policy actions that can be taken to reduce informality and increase social protection for workers. It is a must-read for anyone who cares about greater economic inclusion in MENA.' --Ragui Assaad, Professor, Hubert H. Humphrey School of Public Affairs, University of Minnesota 'A compelling account of the implications of informality in the workforce and how economies of MENA can design appropriate policy responses. This timely report comes amid multiple social reforms in MENA and is a must-read for policy practitioners and economists in the region.' --Karim El Aynaoui, Executive President, Policy Center for the New South 'This report is particularly timely given the negative impact the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent crises have had on living standards and poverty rates around the world and especially in MENA countries. While the focus on boosting growth and achieving the Sustainable Development Goals has revolved around financing, the report sheds new light on the benefits that tackling informality through institutional, regulatory, and policy changes could present to achieving these goals.' --Mahmoud Mohieldin, Executive Director, International Monetary Fund

Download or read book Unlocking the Employment Potential in the Middle East and North Africa written by World Bank and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2003 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Private Finance for Development written by Hilary Devine and published by International Monetary Fund. This book was released on 2021-05-14 with total page 161 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Covid-19 pandemic has aggravated the tension between large development needs in infrastructure and scarce public resources. To alleviate this tension and promote a strong and job-rich recovery from the crisis, Africa needs to mobilize more financing from and to the private sector.

Download or read book From Privilege to Competition written by World Bank and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2009-11-04 with total page 276 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'From Privilege to Competition: Unlocking Private-Led Growth in the Middle East and North Africa' sheds new light on the difficult quest for stronger and more diversified growth in a region of unquestionable potential. It underlines the need to strengthen reforms in many areas specifically, by reducing policy uncertainty and improving credit and real estate markets. It also highlights other important issues that restrain the credibility and impact of reforms in many parts of the region: conflicts of interest between politicians and businesses, an investment climate that favors a few privileged firms, and a dominant private sector that often opposes reforms. The book recommends that countries in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) engage in more credible reform agendas by improving the implementation of policies in a manner that will reduce discretion and privileges. This renewed commitment to stronger growth would entail several developments. First, governments will need to reduce opportunities for rent-seeking and foster competition. Second, they will need to work to reform institutions: private sector development policies will need to be systematically anchored in elements of institutional and public sector reforms in order to reduce discretion and opacity and improve the quality of services to firms. Third, they will need to mobilize all stakeholders, including larger representations from the private sector, around dedicated long-term growth strategies. Short of such a fundamental shift in the way private sector policies are formulated and implemented, investor expectations that governments are committed to reform will be limited. It will take political will and time to support sustained reforms that credibly convince investors and the public that changes are real, deep, and set to last. MENA countries are endowed with strong human capital, good infrastructure, immense resources, and a great deal of untapped creativity and entrepreneurship. The economic and social payoff of embarking on a more ambitious private-led growth agenda could thus be immense for all.

Download or read book Public Sector Reform in the Middle East and North Africa written by Robert P. Beschel and published by Brookings Institution Press. This book was released on 2020-12-01 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Critical examinations of efforts to make governments more efficient and responsive Political upheavals and civil wars in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) have obscured efforts by many countries in the region to reform their public sectors. Unwieldy, unresponsive—and often corrupt—governments across the region have faced new pressure, not least from their publics, to improve the quality of public services and open up their decisionmaking processes. Some of these reform efforts were under way and at least partly successful before the outbreak of the Arab Spring in 2010. Reform efforts have continued in some countries despite the many upheavals since then. This book offers a comprehensive assessment of a wide range of reform efforts in nine countries. In six cases the reforms targeted core systems of government: Jordan's restructuring of cabinet operations, the Palestinian Authority's revision of public financial management, Morocco's voluntary retirement program, human resource management reforms in Lebanon, an e-governance initiative in Dubai, and attempts to improve transparency in Tunisia. Five other reform efforts tackled line departments of government, among them Egypt's attempt to improve tax collection and Saudi Arabia's work to improve service delivery and bill collection. Some of these reform efforts were more successful than others. This book examines both the good and the bad, looking not only at what each reform accomplished but at how it was implemented. The result is a series of useful lessons on how public sector reforms can be adopted in MENA.

Download or read book Trade Competitiveness of the Middle East and North Africa written by Jos R. L pez-C lix and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2010-07-01 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Over the past decade, four major developments in global economic integration have shaped trade policy and the economic performance of countries within the Middle East and North Africa region: the emergence of global supply chains, the growth of trade in services, the rise of China and India as major international trading powers, and regional integration. These developments, along with the labor and natural resource endowments of particular countries (some are resource-poor but labor-abundant, some resource-rich and labor-abundant, and some resource-rich and labor-importing), have influenced export diversification outcomes across the region. Yet these countries may not be taking full advantage of all of the opportunities the four new trends offer to them. 'Trade Competitiveness of the Middle East and North Africa: Policies for Export Diversification' examines the region's trade policy agendas and their results by focusing on the countries' response to these four key developments in international trade. As the region recovers from the global financial and economic crises, the book identifies reforms that could allow countries to further strengthen global production networks, benefit more from trade in services, better compete in external markets to face the rise of China and India, and reach the full potential of regional integration. If thoroughly implemented, especially by oil exporters, all of these reforms could help boost growth and job creation in the region.

Download or read book The Growth Report written by Commission on Growth and Development and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2008-07-23 with total page 198 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The result of two years work by 19 experienced policymakers and two Nobel prize-winning economists, 'The Growth Report' is the most complete analysis to date of the ingredients which, if used in the right country-specific recipe, can deliver growth and help lift populations out of poverty.

Download or read book The Mobility of Displaced Syrians written by World Bank and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2020-01-27 with total page 293 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The war in Syria, now in its eighth year, continues to take its toll on the Syrian people. More than half of the population of Syria remains displaced; 5.6 million persons are registered as refugees outside of the country and another 6.2 million are displaced within Syria's borders. The internally displaced persons include 2 million school-age children; of these, less than half attend school. Another 739,000 Syrian children are out of school in the five neighborhood countries that host Syria's refugees. The loss of human capital is staggering, and it will create permanent hardships for generations of Syrians going forward. Despite the tragic prospects for renewed fighting in certain parts of the country, an overall reduction in armed conflict is possible going forward. However, international experience shows that the absence of fighting is rarely a singular trigger for the return of displaced people. Numerous other factors—including improved security and socioeconomic conditions in origin states, access to property and assets, the availability of key services, and restitution in home areas—play important roles in shaping the scale and composition of the returns. Overall, refugees have their own calculus of return that considers all of these factors and assesses available options. The Mobility of Displaced Syrians: An Economic and Social Analysis sheds light on the 'mobility calculus' of Syrian refugees. While dismissing any policies that imply wrongful practices involving forced repatriation, the study analyzes factors that may be considered by refugees in their own decisions to relocate. It provides a conceptual framework, supported by data and analysis, to facilitate an impartial conversation about refugees and their mobility choices. It also explores the diversified policy toolkit that the international community has available—and the most effective ways in which the toolkit can be adapted—to maximize the well-being of refugees, host countries, and the people in Syria.

Download or read book Industrial Policy for the Sustainable Development Goals Increasing the Private Sector s Contribution written by OECD and published by OECD Publishing. This book was released on 2021-09-15 with total page 196 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How can governments support the private sector’s contribution to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)? This book investigates the contribution of firms to the SDGs, particularly through their core business, taking into account inter-sectoral linkages and global value chains, using novel techniques and data sources.

Download or read book Pensions in the Middle East and North Africa written by Edward Whitehouse and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2005-01-01 with total page 286 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the first comprehensive assessment of pension systems in the Middle East and North Africa. While other regions—Central Asia, Eastern Europe, and Latin America, in particular—have been actively introducing reforms to their pension systems, Middle East and North African countries have lagged behind. This is explained, in part, by the common belief that, because demographics remain favorable—the countries are young and the labor force is expanding rapidly—financial problems are far in the future; as a result, pension reform does not have to be a priority in the broader policy agenda.However, the authors show that aging is not the only factor behind a financial crisis; the problem is the generosity of the current schemes. Moreover, badly designed benefit formulas and eligibility conditions introduce unnecessary economic distortions and make the systems vulnerable to adverse distributional transfers. The book does not present a general model that could solve the problems of all pension systems in Middle East and North Africa countries. Instead the authors focus on outlining a framework for guiding discussions on pension reform and making objective policy choices.This assessment will be useful for policy makers and government officials involved in pension reform in the Middle East and North Africa region.

Download or read book Climate Action to Unlock the Inclusive Growth Story of the 21st Century written by Amar Bhattacharya and published by International Monetary Fund. This book was released on 2021-05-26 with total page 65 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Climate change is a major threat to the sustainability and inclusiveness of our societies, and to the planet’s habitability. A just transition to a low-carbon economy is the only viable way forward. This paper reviews the climate change challenge. It stresses the criticality of systems changes (energy, transport, urban, land use, water) in a climate-challenged world, and the importance of infrastructure investment geared toward such systems changes. The key policies to enable the transition are: public spending on and investment frameworks for sustainable infrastructure, pricing carbon, regulations, promoting sustainable use of natural resources, scaling up and aligning finance with climate objectives, low-carbon industrial and innovation policies, building resilience and adaptation, better measurement of well-being and sustainability, and providing information and education on climate risks. Implemented well, climate action would unlock the inclusive growth story of the 21st century, making our societies more sustainable, inclusive, and prosperous.

Download or read book SME Policy Index The Mediterranean Middle East and North Africa 2014 Implementation of the Small Business Act for Europe written by OECD and published by OECD Publishing. This book was released on 2014-09-23 with total page 378 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This report assesses the elaboration and implementation of SME policy in eight Middle East and North African economies of the southern Mediterranean shore.

Download or read book Making It Big written by Andrea Ciani and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2020-10-08 with total page 178 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Economic and social progress requires a diverse ecosystem of firms that play complementary roles. Making It Big: Why Developing Countries Need More Large Firms constitutes one of the most up-to-date assessments of how large firms are created in low- and middle-income countries and their role in development. It argues that large firms advance a range of development objectives in ways that other firms do not: large firms are more likely to innovate, export, and offer training and are more likely to adopt international standards of quality, among other contributions. Their particularities are closely associated with productivity advantages and translate into improved outcomes not only for their owners but also for their workers and for smaller enterprises in their value chains. The challenge for economic development, however, is that production does not reach economic scale in low- and middle-income countries. Why are large firms scarcer in developing countries? Drawing on a rare set of data from public and private sources, as well as proprietary data from the International Finance Corporation and case studies, this book shows that large firms are often born large—or with the attributes of largeness. In other words, what is distinct about them is often in place from day one of their operations. To fill the “missing top†? of the firm-size distribution with additional large firms, governments should support the creation of such firms by opening markets to greater competition. In low-income countries, this objective can be achieved through simple policy reorientation, such as breaking oligopolies, removing unnecessary restrictions to international trade and investment, and establishing strong rules to prevent the abuse of market power. Governments should also strive to ensure that private actors have the skills, technology, intelligence, infrastructure, and finance they need to create large ventures. Additionally, they should actively work to spread the benefits from production at scale across the largest possible number of market participants. This book seeks to bring frontier thinking and evidence on the role and origins of large firms to a wide range of readers, including academics, development practitioners and policy makers.