An empirical study on the nexus of poverty, GDP growth, dependency ratio and employment in developing countries

The paper has scrutinized the nexus among poverty, economic growth, employment and dependency ratio in developing countries. The primary intension behind this study is to find out the association between variables such as poverty, economic growth, agricultural and industrial employment and dependency ratio due to the gap in the existing literature. This study fully relies on cross country data and involves forty one countries which have been selected from Asia, Latin America and Sub-Saharan Africa. For this study, OLS method, correlation and econometric tools have been employed. Two models employed in the analysis are goodness of fit because both p-value and F-statistics in the models are less than 5%. The results bring to light the fact that age dependency ratio has had a tremendous impact on poverty and poverty has had a relatively very high impact on the age dependency ratio. Even though Industrial employment has a negative association with poverty incidence, it does not have a significant impact on poverty. The finding that economic growth, poverty and industrial employment significantly affect the age dependency ratio in model two is practicable and consistent with economic theories. Thus stable economic growth with an increase in labour productivity and labour intensive technology is an active remedy for solving this problem

Can market contribute of the reduction of inequality and poverty in Sri Lanka?

Many economists emphasize that economic growth is necessary to lift the county out of poverty. This growth occurs when market forces are allowed to determine the prices of different products on the market to stimulate productivity and innovation. Markets allow free entry and exit of economic agents. This facilitates market forces of supply and demand to determine prices. At this stage, resources are redistributed in society by an 'invisible hand' to meet the needs of the population. Even though, market is a best allocator of resources, government intervention is also important to regulate the economy. The government should have market friendly approach which stimulates economic growth and thereby reducing poverty and inequality

The effects of exchange rate on the trade balance in the Sri Lankan context after post liberalization

The varying exchange rate exerts remarkable influence on the trade balance and balance of payment. Sri Lanka is no exception to this. The nature and extend of the changes wrought by the exchange rate on the trade balance vary from country to country. The objective of this study was to investigate the relationship between exchange rate and trade balance for Sri Lanka. The study is based on two country model involving trade between Sri Lanka and the U.S.A. This study is based on secondary data. The model I have recourse to is a model adopted by many researchers where the trade balance and real exchange rate are directly linked. The model encompasses the variable such as trade balance, real exchange rate, and real income, converted into log form. The analysis is done by the use of statistical package Eviews 6 which includes the econometric procedures of Unit root test, Engle - Granger and Johansen technique for co- integration and also IRF analysis is done to test J curve effect. The result suggests that variables In TB, In RER, In RSL and In RUS are co- integrated. The results bring to light the fact that the real exchange rate has significantly positive influence on the trade balance of Sri Lanka both in the short- run and the long-run. The Granger causality test confirms the fact that real exchange rate (RER) Granger causes trade balance of Sri Lanka. However there is no evidence of J curve effect for trade between Sri Lanka and USA. In contrast, devaluation improves trade balance in the short- run and continues to do so in the long-run

Poverty incidence and its determinants in the estate sector of Sri Lanka

Poverty measurement and analysis are needed to identify the poor, the nature and extent of poverty and its determinants, and to assess the impact of policies and programmes on the poor. The government of Sri Lanka has been spending huge sums of money for poverty alleviation and social welfare since its independence. Yet, poverty is still severe and widespread in Sri Lanka, especially in the estate and rural areas .The objective of this study is to find out and analyze the significant determinants of the incidence of poverty in the estate sector where the highest level of chronic poverty and unemployment exist. The national and regional poverty survey data and other official socio economic cross sectional data from selected provinces were used to analyze the extent of poverty in plantation sector in which 89 Divisional Secretariat from provinces such as Subaragamuva, Central and Uva were considered for the analysis. The econometric model were fitted and estimated in this study. Furthermore, Log transformation was conducted and heteroskedasticity problem was detected with the use of statistical software. The Ordinary Least Square (OLS) regression analysis clearly indicates that, variables such as industrial employment, education, access to market and infrastructure significantly and negatively affect the poverty incidence of the estate sector. Also, agricultural employment has a negative impact but not significant. The R2 of 0.82 explains the statistical fitness of the model and the Prob (F-statistics) also confirms it. Analysis with the Durbin–Watson stat confirms that, there is no auto correlation between the variables. The results emphasize the need for adapting policies for regional infrastructural improvement as well as market and educational development in the plantation sector

The trend and impact of small and medium enterprises on the economic growth of Sri Lanka

Even though SMEs play important role in both developed and newly industrialized countries, there is insignificant impact of SMEs on the Sri Lankan economy. The prime intension of this study is to find out the association between economic growth and SMEs in Sri Lanka. Furthermore, this study analyzes the trend of small and medium enterprises in employment generation and value added. The secondary data have been employed. Headcount index and SMEs' employment data have been interpolated because of non-availability of some data. The simple multiple regression model was employed to analyze the data. Heteroskedasticity and serial correlation problems were detected by using Eviews option. The finding clearly shows that there is positive relationship between economic growth and SMEs but, impact of SMEs on economic growth is not significant in Sri. Lanka. Even though the co-efficient of SMEs is 0.02 indicating that there is positive relationship between economic growth and SMEs, the impact of SMEs on economic growth is statistically insignificant. Another finding is that there is vast number of industrial establishments of SMEs in total establishments which do not significantly contribute to the employment generation and value added in Sri Lanka. Therefore, active private public participation (PPP) is needed to accelerate the growth and improvement of SMEs and thereby, its contribution to the economy can be enhanced. Thus, author suggests that public private participation in regard to SMEs is an effective remedial measure to promote SMEs and enhance their contribution to the national economic development

Companies´ performance from automotive industry in a relationship with the economic situation on chosen markets during 2007-2010 period

The main aim of this paper was to answer questions connected with the issue of accepted concern business strategy. Mainly with their influence on functioning of individual subsidiary companies in the interaction with macroeconomic surrounding represented with chosen macroeconomic indicators not only during the global cirsis. The main parts of investigation were based on the development of performance indicators of subsidiary companies, concern as the whole and chosen macro indicators when looking for their reciprocal dependency in the period of global crisis 2007 - 2010. In the contribution the authors used an elementary analysis of time line characteristics of chosen Key Performance Indicators – Result Indicators of the companies. With the help of regress and correlation analysis there were further researched some relationships among chosen indicators of company, concern as the whole and chosen macro-indicator concerning the biggest markets for the companies. For the following calculation of tested criteria Cohen´s Coefficient was used to be able to asses the effect of the group on the value variability of studied random quantity