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421. Poverty and Health in Developing Countries: Key Actions

Publication Date:
11-2003
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
Abstract:
Health is higher on the international agenda than ever before and improving the health of poor people is a central issue in development. Poor people suffer worse health and die younger. They have higher than average child and maternal mortality, higher levels of disease, and more limited access to healthcare and social protection. But health is also a crucially important economic asset, particularly for poor people. Their livelihoods depend on it. When poor people become ill or injured, their entire household can become trapped in a downward spiral of lost income and high healthcare costs.
Topic:
Agriculture, Economics, Environment, Human Rights, International Organization, and Political Economy

422. Economic Survey of Austria, 2003

Publication Date:
10-2003
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
Abstract:
To raise Austria's growth potential, significant changes in the institutional set-up will be necessary in order to achieve sound public finances, higher labour force participation - in particular among older workers - and to open up the sheltered sectors of the economy to healthy competition. Although the government's emphasis on structural spending reductions to achieve eventual budget balance while also creating room for tax cuts is appropriate, earlier fiscal easing means that under current plans budget balance will be restored only after 2007. Such a deficit path is not appropriate given Austria's high debt-to-GDP ratio. Stronger spending restraint will be necessary in order to create room for the major tax reform that the authorities are committed to. Public expenditure reform is focused on reducing public sector employment, but the cost savings are eroded by the generous early retirement programmes used to achieve these employment reductions. Comprehensive public sector reform has to address the complicated -federal fiscal relationships and make sure that tasks are allocated to the most appropriate private or public agent. More cost-benefit analysis and output performance budgeting would help to improve the efficiency with which public resources are used. The pension reform undertaken by the government marks considerable progress in moving to sustainable old-age income replacement through measures designed to increase further the labour force participation rate of older workers and women and lengthen working lives considerably. Further necessary action includes measures to improve the employability of older workers, in particular the elimination of excessive seniority wage components, and a more stringent revision of the remaining age-specific employment protection regulation. The large differences in economic performance between manufacturing, which is fully exposed to international competition, and services points to considerable scope for increasing competition by reducing entry barriers and facilitating the operations of the newly established competition authority. Proceeding along these lines will help Austria to realise the positive potential associated with Eastern enlargement while at the same time becoming more resilient to adverse supply side shocks.
Topic:
Agriculture, Economics, Environment, Human Rights, International Organization, and Political Economy
Political Geography:
Austria

423. MAgricultural Policies in OECD Countries: A Positive Reform Agenda

Publication Date:
06-2003
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
Abstract:
OECD countries have recently agreed to a positive reform agenda for agricultural policies. Central to this agenda is the need to set out clearly the objectives of agricultural policies, and to monitor the performance of alternative policies in attaining them. In most cases, the best way to achieve an objective is to target it directly. Thus, where agriculture is deemed to provide public services, such as a pleasing countryside or environmental benefits, any required support for those services could be provided directly, rather than through policies that stimulate output. Conversely, environmental degradation could be taxed or regulated at source. Where agricultural households have low incomes, there may be a case for policies that concentrate benefits among poorer households, as opposed to blanket support measures that pay more to larger (and typically wealthier) farmers and to landowners. Reform along these lines would improve the cost-effectiveness of government programmes, and would greatly reduce disruptions to international markets. At the same time, not everyone will gain from reform, at least in the short term. There may therefore be a need for temporary adjustment assistance for farm households that are negatively affected. The broader opportunities to improve economic well-being call for policies that respond explicitly to a more diverse range of societal interests.
Topic:
Agriculture, Economics, Environment, and International Trade and Finance

424. Public-Private Partnerships in the Urban Water Sector

Publication Date:
04-2003
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
Abstract:
The urban water sector presents difficult economic and political choices for governments. The provision of water and sanitation services has undoubtedly reduced disease and yielded other health benefits. Free or cheap access to water has also spurred a variety of other uses from maintaining lawns to washing cars. At the same time, this sector is plagued by a long history of under-pricing, and opposition to full cost pricing for ethical and social reasons. These factors have contributed to the unwillingness of many governments to acknowledge water as a finite natural resource and an economic good – a commodity that needs a market price reflecting the cost of provision and its true value to society.
Topic:
Agriculture, Economics, Government, and Industrial Policy

425. Improving Water Management: Recent OECD Experience Water management - a serious challenge for sustainable development

Publication Date:
03-2003
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
Abstract:
There is widespread concern that poor water management will be one of the major factors limiting sustainable development during the next few decades. Water shortages are common in many regions, and are exacerbated by the pollution or degradation of many water bodies. There are conflicting demands for available water resources, both between human, economic, and ecosystem needs and between regions sharing a single water basin, in some cases leading to geopolitical security threats. World population roughly doubled over the last 50 years, while water consumption worldwide quadrupled. With urban populations growing faster than rural populations, the financial pressures on urban water utilities are intensifying.
Topic:
Agriculture, Economics, Environment, Human Rights, International Organization, and Political Economy

426. Take the State Back Out? Comparing French Responses to Globalization in Agriculture and Shipping

Author:
Mark Aspinwall and Imtiaz Hussain
Publication Date:
02-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económicas
Abstract:
How autonomous is a state in today's highly interdependent international economy to pursue policies that diverge widely from the international norm? Does the degree of autonomy vary for different domestic sectors? We adapt and apply Benjamin Cohen's unholy trinity model (1993), to a comparative assessment of how France responded to globalization over agriculture and shipping, focusing on three dimensions—investment, transaction costs, and government policy responses. Although France is reputed to possess a strong state machinery (Katzenstein, 1987; Wilson, 1987; Skocpol, 1985), our analysis raises qualifications. On the one hand, regardless of government policy intentions, we find irreversible forms of disinvestment in both sectors, though different in nature—geographic for shipping, and functional for agriculture; on the other, we also find continued dependence upon the state—for aid in shipping and resisting free trade in agriculture. We further find that, although internal and endogenous, as well as external and exogenous, factors influence policy-making, the nature of these factors are different for the two sectors. We conclude by drawing implications of our findings for state-society relations and European integration.
Topic:
Agriculture, Economics, and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
Africa, Europe, and France

427. Persistence of Underdevelopment: Does the Type of Natural Resource Endowment Matter?

Author:
Maiju Perälä
Publication Date:
04-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
This paper examines growth successes and failures across countries and notes the latter's perplexing predominance among ex ante low-income economies. An explanation for this persistence of underdevelopment is proposed through an empirical investigation that brings forth evidence on the importance of natural resource endowment type on growth or, more appropriately, lack of it. The results show that, in the absence of social cohesion, the nature of natural resource abundance bears great significance as a natural resource endowment characterized by oil and/or mineral resources is more negatively correlated with growth than a resource endowment that is agricultural. The robustness of this result is tested across a number of growth regression specifications within the literature.
Topic:
Agriculture, Development, Economics, and Poverty

428. OECD Domestic Support and Developing Countries

Author:
Betina Dimaranan, Thomas Hertel, and Roman Keeney
Publication Date:
04-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
An AGE model with detailed farm supply and substitution relationships is used to analyze impacts of OECD domestic support reform on developing economy welfare. Stylized simulations indicate reforms best suited for reducing trade distortions with least impact on farm incomes. Comprehensive reforms result in welfare losses for LDCs and large declines in OECD farm incomes. Shifting from market price support to land-based payments designed to maintain farm incomes results in increased welfare for most developing countries. LDCs should focus on improved market access to OECD economies while permitting said economies to continue domestic support payments not linked to output/variable inputs.
Topic:
Agriculture, Development, Economics, and International Trade and Finance

429. Trade Liberalization, Agriculture, and Poverty in Low-income Countries

Author:
Kym Anderson
Publication Date:
03-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
This paper offers an economic assessment of the opportunities and challenges provided by the WTO's Doha Development Agenda, particularly through agricultural trade liberalization, for low-income countries seeking to trade their way out of poverty. After discussing links between poverty, economic growth and trade, it reports modelling results showing that farm product markets remain the most costly of all goods market distortions in world trade. It focuses on what such reform might mean for countries of South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa in particular, both without and with their involvement in the MTN reform process. What becomes clear is that if those countries want to maximize their benefits from the Doha round, they need also to free up their own domestic product and factor markets so their farmers are better able to take advantage of new market-opening opportunities abroad. Other concerns of low-income countries about farm trade reform also are addressed: whether there would be losses associated with tariff preference erosion, whether food-importing countries would suffer from higher food prices in international markets, whether China's WTO accession will provide an example of trade reform aggravating poverty via cuts to prices received by Chinese farmers, and the impact on food security and poverty alleviation. The paper concludes with lessons of relevance for low-income countries for their own domestic and trade policies.
Topic:
Agriculture, Economics, Emerging Markets, International Trade and Finance, and Poverty
Political Geography:
Africa and China

430. Globality and Transnational Policy-Making in Agriculture: Complexity, Contradictions, and Conflict

Author:
William D. Coleman
Publication Date:
06-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute on Globalization and the Human Condition, McMaster University
Abstract:
States and other collective actors are seeking to reconstitute political authority in the 21st Century in part to regulate an ongoing series of globalizing processes. These processes are adding to the spread of globality, consciousness that the world is one place. What is also clear is that attempts to reconstitute authority require states to cooperate with one another in ever increasing ways. The global scope of such cooperation, its regularity, level of institutionalization, and frequency have all contributed to the growth of densely networked transnational policy spaces on an unprecedented scale.
Topic:
Agriculture, Globalization, International Trade and Finance, and Treaties and Agreements