Fiscal aspects of developing countrydebt problems and debt and debt-service reduction operations : a conceptual framework

The causes and implications of the developing country debt crisis - as well as its solution - all have an important fiscal dimension. The crisis was triggered by the widespread perception that the public sectors in many heavily indebted countries were effectively insolvent in the international environment of the early 1980s. The actual fiscal response to the resulting liquidity crisis involved increased reliance on domestic financing, the inflation tax, and the curtailment of public investment. This created adverse adjustment incentives for policymakers and resulted in credit rationing, capital flight, assumption of private external claims by the public sector, and poor domestic investment performance. Solutions involve restoring fiscal health through a combination of debt relief and efficient fiscal adjustment, aimed at mitigating the burden associated with public sector debt service and minimizing the liquidity problems facing the indebted public sector. The debt and debt-service reduction (DDSR) programs implemented so far under the Brady Plan have provided only partial solutions, closing without eliminating the gap between the face value of the external debt and the present value of prospective public sector debt service. They have done so partly by reducing the former and partly by increasing the latter. Their contribution toward easing the immediate liquidity problems of the debtors has not been encouraging. The amount of debt relief embodied in Brady Plan programs enacted so far has not in itself been sufficient to restore fiscal solvency. Better-quality fiscal adjustment could greatly help improve the situation. The most important potential contribution of such programs, then, may have been the reduction - through the policy conditionality associated with resources provided by the international financial institutions - of the secondary burden associated with the internal transfer of resources to the public sector.Banks&Banking Reform,Public Sector Economics&Finance,Environmental Economics&Policies,Economic Theory&Research,Strategic Debt Management

Competition, Corporate Governance, and regulation in Central Asia - Uzbekistan's structural reform challenges

In Uzbekistan state enterprises are being changed into shareholding companies, and private enterprises account for 45 percent of all registered firms. But business decisions to set prices, output, and investment are often not market-based, nor wholly within the purview of businesses, especially those in commercial manufacturing and services. Lines of authority for corporate governance - from state enterprises to private enterprises - are ill-defined, so there is little discipline on corporate performance and little separation between government and business. Nascent frameworks have been created for competition policy (for firms in the commercial sector) and regulatory policy (governing utilities in the infrastructure monopoly sector). Bur implementation and enforcement have been hampered by old-style instruments (such as price controls0 rooted in central planning, by lack of a strong independent regulatory rule-making authority, by the limited understanding, of the basic concepts of competition and regulatory reform, and by weak institutional capabilities for analyzing market structure and business performance. Based on fieldwork in Uzbekistan, the author recommends: 1) Deepening senior policy officials'understanding of, and appreciation of the benefits from, enterprise competition and how it affects economic growth. 2) Reforming competition policy institutions and legal frameworks in line with the country's goal of strengthening structural reforms and improving macroeconomic policy. 3) Improving the ability of government and associated institutions to assess Uzbekistan's industrial market structure and the determinants of enterprise conduct and performance. 4) Making the authority responsible for competition and regulatory policymaking into an independent agency - a"champion"of competition - answerable directly to the prime minister. 5) Strengthening incentives and institutions for corporate governance and bringing them in line with international practice. 6) Subjecting infrastructure monopolies to systemic competitive restructuring and unbundling, where appropriate. For other utilities, de-politicize tariff setting and implementation of regulations; ensure that price, pro-competitive (creating a level playing field among users); and increase transparency and accountability to the public.Environmental Economics&Policies,Economic Theory&Research,International Terrorism&Counterterrorism,Markets and Market Access,Enterprise Development&Reform,Environmental Economics&Policies,National Governance,Access to Markets,Markets and Market Access,Economic Theory&Research

THE TURKISH BANKING SECTOR - CHALLENGES AND OUTLOOK IN TRANSITION TO EU MEMBERSHIP

The paper explores the readiness of the Turkish banking sector for integration into the European Union. We address the issue from four different angles. First, we review the present structure and health of the sector, including the state of the regulatory framework, providing where possible a comparative perspective with the larger EU accession countries. Second, we look at the sector's financial solidity in 2003, with a view to gauging its readiness to adapt to a more challenging banking environment. Third, we look at the present obstacles to financial deepening and identify the most pressing issues that seem to hinder the sector's growth. Fourth, we explore issues of productivity and efficiency in the sector. In a final section, we ask the question of whether the Turkish banking sector is or will be ready in due time for EU accession and formulate some policy recommendations. We conclude that in 2004 the Turkish banking sector compares well with those of the new members of the EU. The major source of financial instability in the past was macroeconomic instability and government involvement. At present Turkey is closer to achieving macro-stability than ever in the past, and the government is reducing its direct involvement. Major strides have been accomplished after the crisis of 2001 in cleaning up a very nontransparent and politicized banking environment and in upgrading the regulatory structure to EU standards. Clearly, the job is not finished yet, with the challenge of introducing risk-management based on Basle II and of bringing the capital market to EU standards. Further consolidation and mergers with foreign partners will be inevitable. Should EU integration become a concrete vision of the future, macro stability has great chances to become rooted in Turkey and the banking sector will quickly move to EU standards, long before any accession date.Banking sector; European Union; integration; Turkey; regulatory framework

Cote d'Ivoire : private sector dynamics and constraints

Private sector assessments provide information and analysis essential to formulating strategies for alleviating constraints on private sector development. They are meant to contribute both to the Bank's policy dialogue with borrowing governments and to the formulation of country assistance strategies. Theauthors examine the constraints on growth faced by private enterprises and how these relate to the policy and institutional environment in Cote d'Ivoire. They employ new data sources as well as surveys of, and in-depth interviews with, private entrepreneurs. They focus on: the effects of taxes and labor regulation on private firms; the impact of public spending on private sector development; and the role of informality in enterprise activity. Following are some of their findings. Tax policy and enforcement impose a heavy financial burden on a shrinking base of formal enterprises, whose regulatory burden has also grown. Taxes are increasingly independent of a firm's profits. This substantial fixed cost may lead some businesses to exit prematurely and may discourage others from formal entry. The overall tax burden on small and medium-size enterprises has risen disproportionately, to levels that discourage formal participation in the economy. Informal firms pay some taxes, but there is considerable leakage in collection. Unnecessary rigidities in labor policies weigh less heavily than expected on firms, because they avoid their full costs through such means as subcontracting and apprenticeships. The restrictions nonetheless limit firms'flexibility of operation and ability to reward merit. In the 1980s, public spending increasingly channeled limited financial resources and human capital toward nondevelopment purposes, including poorly performing enterprises and elite-oriented services, precluding their use in the private sector. The methods of financing public spending (such as withholding taxes and accumulating arrears) have sharply curtailed the capital available to private enterprises. The public sector's dramatic accumulation of arrears and growing reputation as a bad customer are undermining the competitive private supply of goods and services to the government. Government employment policies attract many of the most qualified potential entrepreneurs and business professionals to governmentemployment. Rather than a sharp divide, there is a continuum between small informal and large formal firms. Some medium-size and large formal firms engage in informal behavior, and large firms sometimes lower their costs through links with informal firms - including purchases of inputs that have escaped regulation and taxes.Banks&Banking Reform,Environmental Economics&Policies,Public Sector Economics&Finance,Private Participation in Infrastructure,Microfinance

Trends in private sector development in World Bank education projects

Emerging trends in education show the private sector to be playing an increasingly important role in financing and providing educational services in many countries. Private sector development has not arisen primarily through public policy design, but has of course been affected by the design, and limitations of public policy. The author traces trends in private sector development in eleven of seventy World Bank education projects in 1995-97, asking two questions: What has been the rationale for Bank lending in education? And, in countries where there is both privately financed, and publicly financed, and provided education, how has the Bank encouraged the private sector to thrive? The eleven country samples reveal that the Bank's interest in private sector development is basically in capacity-oriented privatization, to absorb excess demand for education. This is crucial to the Bank's general strategy for education lending: promoting access with equity, focusing on efficiency in resource allocation, promoting quality, and supporting capacity building. Absorbing excess demand tends to involve poorer families, usually much poorer than those that take advantage of other forms of privatized education. The Bank emphasizes capacity-oriented privatization, especially of teacher training for primary, and secondary schools, as well as institutional capacity building for tertiary, and vocational education. The underlying principle is that strengthening the private sector's role in non-compulsory education over time, will release public resources for the compulsory (primary) level. The private sector is emerging as a force governments, donors, and other technical assistance agencies cannot ignore. Often the term private sector encompasses households'out-of-pocket expenses, rather than describing for-profit, or not-for-profit (religious or otherwise) sectors. And lumpy investments, supporting both private, and public education, are the norm.Health Monitoring&Evaluation,Decentralization,Teaching and Learning,Public Health Promotion,Curriculum&Instruction,Primary Education,Gender and Education,Economics of Education

Intersectoral financial flows in developing countries

This paper is about financial flows in developing countries. It reviews the evidence on who the borrowers and lenders are. Apart from collecting and summarizing available data from some seventeen countries, the paper presents the results of an econometric analysis of the interactions between the net lending behaviour of the different sectors. The paper is organized as follows. Section 2 clarifies some terms and in particular explains what a complete set of flow of funds accounts looks like. Section 3 provides an analytical framework for the consideration of flow of funds data. Section 4 reports the main data on sectoral surpluses and deficits and summarizes the empirical findings on their mutual interaction and on their determinants. Section 5 describes the typical pattern in developing countries of financial flows by instrument. A summary and conclusion is presented in section 6.Banks&Banking Reform,Economic Theory&Research,Financial Intermediation,Environmental Economics&Policies,International Terrorism&Counterterrorism

Images and Concepts of the Third Sector in Europe

Peer reviewe

New Directions in the Relationship Between Public and Private Debt

Until the 1980s the outstanding indebtedness of government and private-sector borrowers in the United States exhibited sufficient negative covariation that total outstanding debt remained steady relative to nonfinancial economic activity. Three hypotheses -- one based on lenders' behavior, one on borrowers? behavior, and one on credit market institutional arrangements -- provide potential explanations for this phenomenon. Since 1980 the U.S. debt markets have departed from these previously prevailing patterns, however, as both government and private borrowing have risen sharply.

The lender of last resort function under a currency board : the case of Argentina

Within the current rules of the game, Argentina's central bank (BCRA) is charged with being the lender of last resort as well as providing full convertibility between pesos and U.S. dollars - two objectives with one instrument, namely, reserves. Within those rules, it may be well that the balance of responsibilities needs to shift. Complete dollarization can significantly reduce risks but not entirely eliminate them. If the BCRA can concentrate more on building up reserves and helping to ward off crises of confidence in the currency, perhaps the banking system can protect itself better from liquidity shocks. But this will require, among other things, consolidation of the sector (which could give it greater access to outside liquidity) and prudential strengthening of the system. Triage of weaker banks should continue and not await another crisis. More experience with the new liquidity policy is needed and so is reform of the settlement system, as it affects the functioning of the interbank market, which is essential for containing crises. Essentially, however, no grand solution seems to exist for the problems that seem inevitable in a system where the central bank is also the currency board. Argentina's strategy must therefore turn on actively strengthening its banking systems to reduce the risks of insolvency.Financial Intermediation,Payment Systems&Infrastructure,Banks&Banking Reform,Financial Crisis Management&Restructuring,Economic Theory&Research,Banks&Banking Reform,Financial Intermediation,Financial Crisis Management&Restructuring,Economic Theory&Research,Banking Law

Vietnam - on the road to labor-intensive growth ?

Since Vietnam's adoption of the doi moi or renovation policy in 1986, the country has been undergoing the transition from central planning to a socialist market-oriented economy. This has translated into strong economic growth, led by the industrial sector, which expanded more than 13 percent a year from 1993 to 1997. Vietnamese policymakers are concerned, however, that employment growth has lagged. To address this concern, the author compares new employment data from the Vietnam Living Standards Survey (VLSS 2), completed in 1997-98, with data from the first household survey undertaken in 1992-93. He shows that in 1993-97, industrial employment grew an average of about 4 percent a year, which is low compared with industrial GDP growth. This slower growth was attributable to the capital-intensive, import-substituting nature of the state sector and foreign investment, which dominate industry. The more labor-intensive, export-oriented domestic private sector is still small, although growing quickly. In the future, growth promises to become more labor-intensive. Before the Asian crisis there were signs of anemerging export-oriented sector. Using previous statistical analysis (Wood and Mayer 1998) as well as factor content calculations, the author estimates that given Vietnam's endowment of natural and human resources, Vietnam could triple its manufacturing exports and create about 1.6 million manufacturing jobs in export sectors in the near future. After examining Vietnam's labor regulations, the author concludes that there is no need for basic reform of the labor market. At current levels, minimum wages and nonwage regulations (even if better enforced) are unlikely to inhibit development of the private sector or hurt export competitiveness. But a restrictive interpretation of the Labor Code's provisions on terminating employment could hurt foreign investment, reduce the speed of reform in the state sector, and slow the reallocation of resources to the domestic private sector.Labor Policies,Environmental Economics&Policies,Economic Theory&Research,Banks&Banking Reform,Public Health Promotion,Health Monitoring&Evaluation,Economic Growth,Economic Theory&Research,Banks&Banking Reform,Environmental Economics&Policies