This paper assesses the implications of large-scale investments in biofuels for growth and income distribution. We find that biofuels investment enhances growth and poverty reduction despite some displacement of food crops by biofuels. Overall, the biofuel investment trajectory analyzed...

This paper presents an ex ante analysis of the private and social profitability of the introduction of Bt cotton for a major cotton producing area of northern Mozambique. Cotton is especially relevant to rural poverty reduction because smallholders often have few alternative cash earning...

Cotton is one of the most important smallholder cash crops in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). How to ensure input supply, credit recovery and competition is a subject of intense policy debate. This paper examines the performance of cotton sector development policies in Mozambique and Zambia. Both...

This paper demonstrates that income survey data can be very informative in explaining the variation across households in the incidence and severity of absolute poverty using a rural household income data set for Mozambique. Results from regression analysis of the sources of variation are used to...

The primary objective of this research was to measure the extent of market integration between major surplus and deficit maize markets in Mozambique namely, Chimoio-Maputo, Chimoio-Beira, Ribaue-Nampula, and Mocuba-Nampula. To achieve this objective, Threshold Vector Autoregressive models were...

The objective of measuring poverty is usually to make comparisons over time or between two or more groups. Comm on statistical inference methods are used to determine whether an apparent difference in measured poverty is statistically significant. Studies of relative poverty have long recognized...

Maize is an important staple in Mozambique. It is also a dominant crop produced by smallholder farmers. However, the actual maize yields, currently estimated at 1.4 tons/ha, fall short of potential yields of 5-6.5 tons/ha. With population growth rate increasingly exceeding agricultural (and...

The Brazilian government has announced volunteer targets to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions during the 2009 COP meeting in Copenhagen. In this paper we estimate the economic impacts from alternative policies to achieve such targets, including actions to cut emissions from deforestation and...

Market access has been at the core of eight negotiating rounds of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT). Yet, agricultural trade remains a heavily protected sector, characterized by higher tariffs relative to industrial goods, large tariff dispersions, numerous specific tariffs and...

Zambia's strong dependence on copper exports has suppressed other tradables sectors, indicative of a Dutch disease phenomenon. The current copper crisis will have strong economic effects, possibly reversing such Dutch disease effects. We use a computable general equilibrium model built around a...