27,033 research outputs found
Incentive policies and agricultural performance in sub-Saharan Africa
No full textExports in general, and agricultural exports in particular, are more responsive to price incentives in Sub-Saharan Africa than in developing countries.. These are the results of an econometric investigation on the effects of real exchange rates on exports. It further appears that in Sub-Saharan Africa the impact of real exchange rates is greater on agricultural exports than on the exports of goods and services. Within Sub-Saharan Africa, market-oriented countries generally gained export market shares while interventionist countries lost shares. This occurred when market-oriented, not interventionist countries, maintained realistic exchange rates and did not bias incentives against exports. For example, Kenya and the Ivory Coast exemplify market-oriented, and Tanzania and Ghana interventionist, countries. Pairwise comparisons between the Ivory Coast and Ghana have indicated the superiority of the market-oriented approach in promoting exports and agricultural production.Economic Theory&Research,TF054105-DONOR FUNDED OPERATION ADMINISTRATION FEE INCOME AND EXPENSE ACCOUNT,Export Competitiveness,Environmental Economics&Policies,Access to Markets
Family planning programs in sub-Saharan Africa
No full textIn the 1980s, signs that sub-Saharan Africans would welcome family planning in numbers sufficient to make a difference in fertility rates were scattered and weak. Pessimists cited formidable cultural and socioeconomic barriers; optimists provided resources for pilot projects, coupled with research to document results and to guide expansion and replication. Among projects with measurable achievements in acceptance of family planning in settings that were less than promising were the Ghana Registered Midwives Project, the Ruhengeri Project in Rwanda, and the Sudan Community-Based Family Health Project. All were associated with the Operations Research Program of Columbia University's Center for Population and Family Health. In Ghana, midwives in private practice were trained and given other support to initiate family planning services. In Rwanda, rural community development volunteers added family planning to their educational activities. In the Sudan, rural catchment areas and work assignments of rural primary health care personnel were changed to introduce family planning and strengthen other child survival services. Positive results were evident from quantitative measures of service delivery and, in Rwanda and the Sudan, from an increase in contraceptive prevalence in the project areas. Other criteria for success included improved management skills, motivation for replicating successful programmatic elements, and potential for continuity. Questions remain as to why attitudes changed, when contraceptive use for family limitation will be practiced widely, and how applicable the experiences reported here are to other locations. These projects do not provide the answers. They do, nonetheless, support an optimistic view for the future offamily planning in sub-Saharan Africa.Health Monitoring&Evaluation,Adolescent Health,ICT Policy and Strategies,Agricultural Knowledge&Information Systems,Early Child and Children's Health
The reform of mechanisms for foreign exchange allocation : theory and lessons from sub-Saharan Africa
No full textAdministrative exchange allocation has been common in developing countries, especially in sub-Saharan Africa. Steps to dismantle or modify these control mechanisms have been carried out through traditional schemes. The authors draw lessons from sub-Saharan Africa's historical experience useful both to African former socialist economies. Exchange regime reform should be given highest priority for its role in reducing anti-export bias. Although many sub-Saharan countries have attempted to reform their allocation mechanisms, only a few have made the transition to market allocation (virtually convertible currency, at least on the current account.) Failure to do so is the major shortcoming of most adjustment packages. Both gradual and rapid approaches have succeeded. On purely economic grounds (given the problems of such intermediate steps as auctions), speed is preferable but it is not always politically or institutionally feasible. The transition must be accompanied by a coherent set of fiscal and monetary policies and a willingness to allow the exchange rate to seek a true market-clearing level. Some lessons regarding the specific mechanisms, discussed in approximate order of their proximity to convertibility, are as follows. The most rudimentary transition mechanism is the own-funds scheme, which is no more than a beginning of reform. Own-funds schemes should be accompanied by liberalization of the rules governing exports, or illegal exports and the black market premium may increase. Export retention schemes can minimize the adverse effects on exporters of foreign exchange shortages, reduce the implicit export tax, and fund a legal private exchange market. But the retained funds must be saleable, the retention rates substantial, and traditional exports must be included to adequately fund the legal private exchange market. Open general licensing (OGL) and similar schemes can be a useful intermediate step in liberalizing import and exchange allocation regimes. But in practice the benefits are limited by two features. First, consumer goods competing with local production, whose imports were restricted the most, have usually been excluded, at least initially. Moreover, OGL has no endogenous price-setting mechanism for the exchange rate. The OGL rate should generally be connected to, but lower than, the parallel rate. An auction incorporates a pricing mechanism, which is an important advantage. But the pricing mechanism must be allowed to work, which has not always been the case. Auction rules should be clear (should not allow discretionary disqualification of bids, for example), should minimize participation costs, and allow wide participation. Marginal, rather than the more common Dutch, pricing system is preferred. The use of a reservation price may reduce volatility but may also impede the full disbursement of funds. The shortcomings of transitional schemes to dismantle or modify foreign exchange controls become more important the longer they are in place. A strong case can be made for avoiding delay in moving to full currency convertibility.Environmental Economics&Policies,Economic Theory&Research,Economic Stabilization,Access to Markets,Markets and Market Access
A framework for the analysis of mineral tax policy in sub-Saharan Africa
No full textGiven the dual role played by the Government as resource owner and tax collector in many sub - Saharan economies, it is important to separate"resource factor payments"from taxes through the use of different instruments. The instruments to be considered are: (1) a factor payment system that includes"ad rem"or"ad valorem"royalties. Production sharing, resource rent schemes, and fixed fees could also be used, but some form of unit payment is necessary and justified, because natural resources in the ground are inputs into the production process; (2) a cash flow and withholding tax system initially for the mineral sectors and eventually for other sectors of the economy. The cash flow tax would capture a share of the"economic rent"from each sector and be neutral across sectors; and (3) a depletion account to preserve the nations capital stock. Natural resources are part of an economy's capital stock, which will fall unless"replacement investment"is made as the resource is depleted.Economic Theory&Research,Environmental Economics&Policies,Banks&Banking Reform,Public Sector Economics&Finance,Health Economics&Finance
Stakeholder-driven transformative adaptation is needed for climate-smart nutrition security in sub-Saharan Africa - author correction
No full textImproving nutrition security in sub-Saharan Africa under increasing climate risks and population growth requires a strong and contextualized evidence base. Yet, to date, few studies have assessed climate-smart agriculture and
nutrition security simultaneously. Here we use an integrated assessment framework (iFEED) to explore stakeholder-driven scenarios of food system transformation towards climate-smart nutrition security in Malawi, South Africa, Tanzania and Zambia. iFEED translates climate–food–emissions
modelling into policy-relevant information using model output implication statements. Results show that diversifying agricultural production towards more micronutrient-rich foods is necessary to achieve an adequate population-level nutrient supply by mid-century. Agricultural areas must expand unless unprecedented rapid yield improvements are achieved. While these transformations are challenging to accomplish and often
associated with increased greenhouse gas emissions, the alternative for a nutrition-secure future is to rely increasingly on imports, which would outsource emissions and be economically and politically challenging given the large import increases required
Sex composition of children and spousal sexual violence in sub-Saharan Africa
No full textObjective
In societies with a cultural preference for sons over daughters, women who do not bear sons may be at increased risk for spousal violence. This study examined whether women with daughters only are at an elevated risk for spousal sexual violence compared to women with sons only in sub-Saharan Africa. The study tested the hypothesis that the association between sex composition of children and spousal sexual violence would be observed only in large families.
Methods
Data were from the most recent (as at February, 2016) Demographic and Health Surveys conducted in 22 sub-Saharan African countries for 37,915 women. Odds ratios comparing experience of spousal sexual violence of women with sons only to those with daughters only were estimated, separately for women with three or fewer children and those with four or more children, controlling for age, age at first cohabitation, age at first birth, educational attainment, urban residence, and household wealth.
Results
Having daughters only was associated with a greater likelihood of spousal sexual violence among women with many children (adjusted odds ratio [AOR] = 1.53; 95% CI = 1.02–2.30) but not among those with few children (AOR = 0.92; 95% CI = 0.82–1.04).
Conclusions for practice
A higher risk of sexual violence for women without sons suggests that son preference may have implications on women’s health and wellbeing. Efforts to further understand and address increased risk of sexual violence for women without sons should consider son preference and intra-couple conflict concerning fertility intentions.Peer reviewe
Privatization in sub-Saharan Africa: On Factors Affecting Implementation
No full textPrivatization, Positive models, Normative models, Economic policy , Sub-Saharan experience
World Bank adjustment lending and economic performance in sub-Saharan Africa in the 1980s : a comparison of early adjusters, late adjusters, and nonadjusters
No full textUsing a methodology that allows for endogenizing decisions to participate in World Bank adjustment lending programs, and for testing the validity of assumptions about program participation, the author studies the effectiveness of these programs in sub - Saharan Africa. He shows that adjustment programs in sub - Saharan Africa had no statistically significant effect on growth in the second half of the 1980s, compared with the first half, but they have had a significant and deleterious effect on investment. Adjustment lending has significantly improved export performance in sub - Saharan Africa, at least compared with nonadjusting African countries. The perceived increases in export competitiveness and in the efficiency of investment (supposed to be generated by reform programs) has not been sufficient to counterbalance the ensuing decline in investment and hence to restore economic growth in sub - Saharan Africa. These findings must be qualified: the methodology for classifying countries as adjusting or nonadjusting does not allow for different degrees of implementation - so, strictly speaking, the findings reflect an assessment of the effectiveness of a proxy (adjustment lending) for the adjustment programs.Economic Theory&Research,Environmental Economics&Policies,Achieving Shared Growth,Economic Stabilization,Economic Conditions and Volatility
Real overvaluation, terms of trade shocks, and the cost to agriculture in sub-Saharan Africa
No full textStarting from the premise that agriculture should be pivotal in the structural transformation and economic development of sub - Saharan Africa, the author addresses two related issues. First, the extent to which policy induced distortions influence the structure of incentives for agriculture (with direct distortions induced by policies aimed directly at agriculture distinguished from indirect policies aimed at the economy's macroeconomic management). The second issue is how these distortions affect agriculture's growth, given other growth fundamentals. Preliminary analysis of evidence in sub - Saharan Africa links the observed declines in agriculture and the general worsening of economic conditions to economic distortions. A more rigorous analysis, using data from the Sudan, an African country with a sizable agricultural economy, strongly supports the predictions of an endogenous growth model, which states the deleterious effects of economic distortions on growth.Environmental Economics&Policies,Economic Stabilization,Achieving Shared Growth,Macroeconomic Management,Economic Theory&Research
Agricultural Productivity and Policies in Sub-Saharan Africa
No full textWe analyze the evolution of Sub-Saharan Africa’s agricultural total factor productivity (TFP) over the past 45 years, looking for evidence of recent changes in growth patterns using an improved nonparametric Malmquist index. Our TFP estimates show a remarkable recovery in the performance of Sub-Saharan Africa’s agriculture between 1984 and 2006 after a long period of poor performance and decline. That recovery is the consequence of improved efficiency in production resulting from changes in the output structure and an adjustment in the use of inputs. Policy interventions, including fiscal, trade and sector specific policies, appear to have played an important role in improving agriculture’s performance. Despite the improved agricultural performance, SSA economies face serious challenges to sustain growth. Among these are the small contribution of technical change to TFP growth in the past, the large tax burden imposed by remaining distortions, and the challenge of population growth.agriculture, efficiency, Malmquist index, total factor productivity, technical change, Sub-Saharan Africa, policy, Agricultural and Food Policy, International Development, Productivity Analysis,
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