Do IMF and World Bank programs induce government crises? an empirical analysis

We examine whether and under what circumstances World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) programs affect the likelihood of major government crises. We find that crises are, on average, more likely as a consequence of World Bank programs. We also find that governments face an increasing risk of entering a crisis when they remain under an IMF or World Bank arrangement once the economy's performance improves. The international financial institution's (IFI) scapegoat function thus seems to lose its value when the need for financial support is less urgent. While the probability of a crisis increases when a government turns to the IFIs, programs inherited by preceding governments do not affect the probability of a crisis. This is in line with two interpretations. First, the conclusion of IFI programs can signal the government's incompetence, and second, governments that inherit programs might be less likely to implement program conditions agreed to by their predecessors.

What is wrong with the global support facility for small-scale mining?

The World Bank, United Nations and UK Department for International Development (DfID) have spearheaded a recent global drive to regularize artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM), and provide assistance to its predominantly impoverished participants. To date, millions of dollars have been pledged toward the design of industry-specific policies and regulations; implementation of mechanized equipment; extension; and the launch of alternative livelihood (AL) programmes aimed at diversifying local economies. Much of this funding, however, has failed to facilitate marked improvements, and in many cases, has exacerbated problems. This paper argues that a poor understanding of artisanal, mine-community dynamics and operators’ needs has, in a number of cases, led to the design and implementation of inappropriate industry support schemes and interventions. The discussion focuses upon experiences from sub-Saharan Africa, where ASM is in the most rudimentary of states.

Sustainable agricultural intensification or Jevons paradox? The role of public governance in tropical South America

The process of global deforestation calls for urgent attention, particularly in South America where deforestation rates have failed to decline over the past 20 years. The main direct cause of deforestation is land conversion to agriculture. We combine data from the FAO and the World Bank for six tropical Southern American countries over the period 1970–2006, estimate a panel data model accounting for various determinants of agricultural land expansion and derive elasticities to quantify the effect of the different independent variables. We investigate whether agricultural intensification, in conjunction with governance factors, has been promoting agricultural expansion, leading to a ‘‘Jevons paradox’’. The paradox occurs if an increase in the productivity of one factor (here agricultural land) leads to its increased, rather than decreased, utilization. We find that for high values of our governance indicators a Jevons paradox exists even for moderate levels of agricultural productivity, leading to an overall expansion of agricultural area. Agricultural expansion is also positively related to the level of service on external debt and population growth, while its association with agricultural exports is only moderate. Finally, we find no evidence of an environmental Kuznets curve, as agricultural area is ultimately positively correlated to per-capita income levels.

Environmental and ecological economics in the 21st century: an age adjusted citation analysis of the influential articles, journals, authors and institutions

We investigate the influence of articles, authors, journals and institutions in the field of environmental and ecological economics. We depart from studies that investigated the literature until 2001 and include a time period that has witnessed an enormous increase of importance in the field. We adjust for the age effect given the huge impact of the year of an article's publication on its influence and we show that this adjustment does make a substantial difference — especially for disaggregated units of analysis with diverse age characteristics such as articles or authors. We analyse 6597 studies on environmental and ecological economics published between 2000 and 2009. We provide rankings of the influential articles, authors, journals and institutions and find that Ecological Economics, Energy Economics and the Journal of Environmental Economics and Management have the most influential articles, they publish very influential authors and their articles are cited most. The University of Maryland, Resources for the Future, the University of East Anglia and the World Bank appear to be the most influential institutions in the field of environmental and ecological economics.

Do autocratic states trade less?

Does the political regime of a country influence its involvement in international trade? A theoretical model that predicts that autocracies trade less than democracies is developed, and the predictions of the model are tested empirically using a panel of more than 130 countries for 1962–2000. In contrast to the existing literature, data on the regime type of individual countries are used rather than information about the congruence of the regime type of pairs of trading countries. In line with the model, autocracies are found to import substantially less than democracies, even after controlling for official trade policies. This finding is very stable and does not depend on a particular setup or estimation technique.

Governance, agricultural intensification and land sparing in tropical South America

In this paper we address two topical questions: How do the quality of governance and agricultural intensification impact on spatial expansion of agriculture? Which aspects of governance are more likely to ensure that agricultural intensification allows sparing land for nature? Using data from the Food and Agriculture Organization, the World Bank, the World Database on Protected Areas, and the Yale Center for Environmental Law and Policy, we estimate a panel data model for six South American countries and quantify the effects of major determinants of agricultural land expansion, including various dimensions of governance, over the period 1970–2006. The results indicate that the effect of agricultural intensification on agricultural expansion is conditional on the quality and type of governance. When considering conventional aspects of governance, agricultural intensification leads to an expansion of agricultural area when governance scores are high. When looking specifically at environmental aspects of governance, intensification leads to a spatial contraction of agriculture when governance scores are high, signaling a sustainable intensification process.

Climate change projections and selected impacts for Vietnam

In September 2013, the 5th Assessment Report (5AR) of the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has been released. Taking the 5AR cli-mate change scenarios into account, the World Bank published an earli-er report on climate change and its impacts on selected hot spot re-gions, including Southeast Asia. Currently, dynamical and statistical-dynamical downscaling efforts are underway to obtain higher resolution and more robust regional climate change projections for tropical South-east Asia, including Vietnam. Such initiatives are formalized under the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) Coordinated Regional Dynamic Downscaling Experiment (CORDEX) East Asia and Southeast Asia and also take place in climate change impact projects such as the joint Vietnam-ese-German project “Environmental and Water Protection Technologies of Coastal Zones in Vietnam (EWATEC-COAST)”. In this contribution, the lat-est assessments for changes in temperature, precipitation, sea level, and tropical cyclones (TCs) under the 5AR Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) scenarios 4.5 and 8.5 are reviewed. Special emphasis is put on changes in extreme events like heat waves and/or heavy precipita-tion. A regional focus is Vietnam south of 16°N. A continued increase in mean near surface temperature is projected, reaching up to 5°C at the end of this century in northern Vietnam un-der the high greenhouse-gas forcing scenario RCP8.5. Overall, project-ed changes in annual precipitation are small, but there is a tendency of more rainfall in the boreal winter dry season. Unprecedented heat waves and an increase in extreme precipitation events are projected by both global and regional climate models. Globally, TCs are projected to decrease in number, but an increase in intensity of peak winds and rain-fall in the inner core region is estimated. Though an assessment of changes in land-falling frequency in Vietnam is uncertain due to difficul-ties in assessing changes in TC tracks, some work indicates a reduction in the number of land-falling TCs in Vietnam. Sea level may rise by 75-100 cm until the end of the century with the Vietnamese coastline experienc-ing 10-15% higher rise than on global average. Given the large rice and aquaculture production in the Mekong and Red River Deltas, that are both prone to TC-related storm surges and flooding, this poses a challenge to foodsecurity and protection of coastal population and assets.

Firms’ exporting and importing activities: is there a two-way relationship?

The literature on firm heterogeneity and trade has highlighted that most trading firms tend to engage in both importing and exporting activities. This paper provides some evidence that helps understanding to what extent this is the result of a two-way relationship. Using firm-level data for a group of 27 Eastern European and Central Asian countries from the World Bank Business Environment and Enterprise Performance Survey (BEEPS) over the period 2002–2008, we estimate a bivariate probit model of exporting and importing. After controlling for size (and other firm-level characteristics) we find that firms’ exporting activity does not increase the probability of importing, while the latter has a positive effect on foreign sales. This effect is mainly channeled through an increase in firm productivity and product innovation.

Post-conflict recovery and peacebuilding

Civil wars are the most common type of large scale violent conflict. They are long, brutal and continue to harm societies long after the shooting stops. Post-conflict countries face extraordinary challenges with respect to development and security. In this paper we examine how countries can recover economically from these devastating conflicts and how international interventions can help to build lasting peace. We revisit the aid and growth debate and confirm that aid does not increase growth in general. However, we find that countries experience increased growth after the end of the war and that aid helps to make the most of this peace dividend. However, aid is only growth enhancing when the violence has stopped, in violent post-war societies aid has no growth enhancing effect. We also find that good governance is robustly correlated with growth, however we cannot confirm that aid increases growth conditional on good policies. We examine various aspects of aid and governance by disaggregating the aid and governance variables. Our analysis does not provide a clear picture of which types of aid and policy should be prioritized. We find little evidence for a growth enhancing effect of UN missions and suggest that case studies may provide better insight into the relationship between security guarantees and economic stabilization.

Environmental and ecological economics in the 21st century: an age adjusted citation analysis of the most influential articles, journals, authors and institutions

We investigate the influence of articles, authors, journals and institutions in the field of environmental and ecological economics. We depart from studies that investigated the literature until 2001 and include a time period that has witnessed an enormous increase of importance in the field. We adjust for the age effect given the huge impact of the year of an article's publication on its influence and we show that this adjustment does make a substantial difference — especially for disaggregated units of analysis with diverse age characteristics such as articles or authors. We analyse 6597 studies on environmental and ecological economics published between 2000 and 2009. We provide rankings of the influential articles, authors, journals and institutions and find that Ecological Economics, Energy Economics and the Journal of Environmental Economics and Management have the most influential articles, they publish very influential authors and their articles are cited most. The University of Maryland, Resources for the Future, the University of East Anglia and the World Bank appear to be the most influential institutions in the field of environmental and ecological economics.

Climatic risks and impacts in South Asia: extremes of water scarcity and excess

This paper reviews the current knowledge of climatic risks and impacts in South Asia associated with anthropogenic warming levels of 1.5°C to 4°C above pre-industrial values in the 21st century. It is based on the World Bank Report “Turn Down the Heat, Climate Extremes, Regional Impacts and the Case for Resilience” (2013). Many of the climate change impacts in the region, which appear quite severe even with relatively modest warming of 1.5–2°C, pose significant hazards to development. For example, increased monsoon variability and loss or glacial meltwater will likely confront populations with ongoing and multiple challenges. The result is a significant risk to stable and reliable water resources for the region, with increases in peak flows potentially causing floods and dry season flow reductions threatening agriculture. Irrespective of the anticipated economic development and growth, climate projections indicate that large parts of South Asia’s growing population and especially the poor are likely to remain highly vulnerable to climate change.

The Kasparov-World Match

The Kasparov-World match was initiated by Microsoft with sponsorship from the bank First USA. The concept was that Garry Kasparov as White would play the rest of the world on the Web: one ply would be played per day and the World Team was to vote for its move. The Kasparov-World game was a success from many points of view. It certainly gave thousands the feeling of facing the world’s best player across the board and did much for the future of the game. Described by Kasparov as “phenomenal ... the most complex in chess history”, it is probably a worthy ‘Greatest Game’ candidate. Computer technology has given chess a new mode of play and taken it to new heights: the experiment deserves to be repeated. We look forward to another game and experience of this quality although it will be difficult to surpass the event we have just enjoyed. We salute and thank all those who contributed - sponsors, moderator, coaches, unofficial analysts, organisers, technologists, voters and our new friends.