Lessons from Colombian Economic Development

Colombia is an interesting case study within emerging countries. Through 150 years of democratic tradition and seven decades of sound fiscal and monetary policies, the country has displayed institutional strength and economic growth, in spite of strong external shocks, rent- seeking by sectoral business confederations, and, recently, narco-traffickers and guerrillas. Reforms made during the nineties, just as in other Latin American nations, did not result in the expected take-off in growth. In Colombia, the reason lies partly in the consequences of discovering considerable oil reserves, the escalation of the internal conflict, the fiscal consequences of the 1991 Constitution and huge fiscal commitments related to pensions and social expenditure. In the current decade Colombia has made vast progress in invigorating the sources of economic growth, improving welfare of the poorest strata of population and reinstating the rule of law across the country. The current international crisis poses a considerable challenge in terms of growth and threatens social advancement achieved so far.Government, fiscal policies, national security and war, national budget, economic development, institutions and growth

THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF LABOR REFORM IN COLOMBIA

This paper analyzes the entire reformist effort that spans from 1990 until 2002, emphasizing the second wave that ended with the issuing of a new labor code in 2002. A successful reform has to surpass a set of deals" along the streamline of design, consensus building within civil society, submission to Congress and parliamentary debate, before it gets approved. The paper presents the story of two failed attempts for producing these "deals" within the government, along with labor unions and private sector firm confederations, before the 2002 labor reform was finally enacted. It shows what economic and social considerations created the need for reform, describes the actual policy changes implemented and evaluates their impact. The paper delves deep into the political aspects of the reform effort. Public officials of two governments pursued different lines of reform, discussion strategies and mechanisms for creating consensus, before the initiative gained momentum and circumvented key obstacles. The text of the 2002 reform proposal changed little during five years, but received important additions in the floor of Congress, with little technical support. Finally, an interesting dispute between lawyers and economists is presented regarding the role of the labor code for job creation and its function in the economic cycle. In the case of this reform, economists believed more on the computed elasticities, while lawyers believed more in the stability of established rules and in the limited role of norms. Economists should pay more attention to the workings of the political economy of reform and to the "life cycle of government", both of them critical for success."labor reform

BUDGET INFLEXIBILITY

The study of budgetary institutions has long been an important topic in the economic literature. Nonetheless, the degree of rigidity or inflexibility in budget preparation, a prime preoccupation for policy makers and in particular for finance ministers since a long time ago, has been relatively unexplored. In this paper we show that budget inflexibility can take several forms and argue that it is likely to be closely related to various types of political conflict present in the budget process. Moreover, we study one particular form of budget inflexibility and its connection with one specific (but perhaps the most important) political force driving the budget process. More specifically, we discuss some of the consequences of "expenditure inflexibility," defined as the existence of transfers to special interests enjoying constitutional or legal protection which impede their modification in the short run, in a simple model of legislative bargaining that captures the Tragedy of the Commons present in public budget allocation.Colombia, Fiscal Policy, Budget, Inflexibility

Real Imagery as a Three Dimensional Display

This research effort implemented two 3-D display designs to assess their performance and effect on an observer\u27s depth perception. Both 3-D displays produced real images for the observer to view. The first display setup combined a lens relay with a two concave mirror projector. The second display setup combined the two concave mirror projector with a diffuser. The lens relay/ two concave mirror projector combination was successful in imaging a source from the CRT to a point in space above the two mirror system. The problem was that the observer could not assess the image location by just looking at it because it lacked concrete horizontal and vertical references for the observer to assess along with the image. The three-dimensional effect produced by the image could not be assessed easily because of the limited size of the image. The diffuser/ two concave mirror combination was more successful as a display because it was comfortable to view. The design took advantage of the three-dimensional imaging that the two mirror system was already capable of generating. This design produced an image that the observer easily perceived as floating above the two mirror system. In essence, the image of the diffuser appearing at the top of the mirror system acted as the horizontal and vertical reference that was lacking in the previous experiment. The use of depth cues in the images gave the observer the ability to interpret depth

Determinación de la factibilidad del establecimiento de un laboratorio de Andrología Bovino

La ciudad de Pereira, y, por ende, la Universidad Tecnológica de Pereira, se encuentra ubicada en el centro del triángulo de oro que forman las ciudades de Bogotá, Medellín y Cali. Posee, contando solo el Eje Cafetero y el Valle del Cauca alrededor de 1.000.000 de bovinos. Se ha comprobado que los toros presentan problemas de fertilidad debido principalmente al estrés calórico, la edad, la genética y los producidos por su desempeño con las hembras bovinas entre otros. Se recomienda a nivel internacional, estar practicando exámenes de calidad seminal a los toros para mejorar el porcentaje de natalidad y aumentar los ingresos de los ganaderos. El objetivo de este trabajo fue determinar la factibilidad de un laboratorio de andrología bovino, el cual tenga la capacidad de realizar pruebas de fertilidad a los toros, colectar semen y criopreservarlo para uso en inseminación artificial y determinar la calidad de las pajillas con las que los ganaderos trabajan. Se realizó un estudio de mercado en los municipios de Risaralda y la conclusión fue que la prueba más solicitada para realizar, es la de fertilidad en toros. Con respecto a la normatividad colombiana se deben seguir tres pasos que son: el registro, el reconocimiento y la acreditación. El registro es básicamente la inscripción ante el I.C.A. y está contemplado en la Resolución 001599 del 2007; este es el paso indispensable para su funcionamiento. El reconocimiento y acreditación requieren un proceso más largo y básicamente buscan mejorar la calidad de los servicios prestados. Después de realizar el análisis económico, se demostró que es un proyecto inviable al dar una TIR negativa (-23 %). Se realizó una simulación donde muchos de los costos eran asumidos por una entidad patrocinadora

The Social Impact of the Banking Sector in Colombia, 1995 – 2002

This document studies the impact of the banking sector on social variables in Colombia, and tries to identify how the difference in banking institutions’ development at the municipal levels influences economic and social prosperity of low income households and firms. One part of the literature emphasizes the role of the financial system in promoting this type of agents’ economic performance as long as it attracts them to the use of financial intermediation, making available to them the use of financial services and technologies, both in deposits and credit. Another trend in the literature studies specific characteristics of liquidity constrained agents. This study empirically identifies how bancarization influences poverty and investment on education, in the case of families; and economic performance and the number of firms, in the municipal level in Colombia for the period 1995-2002. When studying these effects we control for local variables such as public spending in investment, homicide rate and guerrilla conflict. The period of study was characterized by the end of an economic boom and recession, which influences our econometric results. This study shows that banking developments affect households’ education decisions and firms’ performance at the municipal level; it was also found that non performing loans are associated with the decrease in the number of firms, but a relationship between loans and the creation of firms was not present.

Uso de semen sexado en bovinos

La ganadería es una de las producciones pecuarias más importantes de Latinoamérica, con el tiempo ha evolucionado el manejo de la misma, implementando así técnicas como la inseminación artificial, sincronización, transferencia de embriones y fertilización in vitro. Últimamente se desarrolló la forma de tener un porcentaje más alto de probabilidad de escoger el sexo a conveniencia del ganadero según la necesidad de la producción. La utilización de semen sexado es una alternativa de gran impacto con mayor interés en hatos lecheros, gracias a la citometría de flujo que permite separar los espermatozoides X de Y, teniendo el cromosoma X un 3.8 al 4% más de ADN y cuyo resultado es aproximadamente el 90% en cuanto a efectividad en el sexo deseado, esto hace que sea una de las elecciones a usar en el momento de la inseminación en latinoamérica

DETERMINANTS AND CONSEQUENCES OF FOREIGN IN DEBTEDNESS IN COLOMBIAN FIRMS

During the nineties the performance of many emerging economies was linked to their access to foreign capital and its impact on the real exchange rate. Colombia was not an exception, as it experienced a sharp boom and bust cycle during the period. Although a number of studies have attempted to explain the recent underperformance of the Colombian economy, few attempts have been made at analyzing firm-level data. In this paper, we rely on information for a large sample of firms during 1995-2001 (nearly 8000 firms on average) and examine the determinants of foreign indebtedness as well as the effects on firm performance of holding dollar debt amid changes in the real exchange rate (i.e. the so called balance sheet effect"). While size is the most robust determinant of dollar indebtedness, matching seems to take place, to the extent that firms in more open sectors and exporting firms have higher shares of dollar debt. In spite of the limited amount of dollar indebtedness of Colombian firms in general, our estimations suggest there is a negative balance sheet effect on firms´ performance (i.e. on profitability). On the other hand, the interaction of dollar indebtedness with the real exchange rate is generally not significant in our investment regressions."Colombia