Rwanda’s Economic Development and Poverty Reduction Strategy provides a medium-term framework for achieving the country’s long-term development goals and aspirations as embodied in Rwanda Vision 2020, the seven-year Government of Rwanda programme, and the Millennium Development...

This annual progress report reviews Burkina Faso’s Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (PRSPs). The regional integration dynamics was considered as an action variable that allowed Burkina Faso to better insert itself into the global economy. The major quantitative objectives of the revised...

This Selected Issues paper analyzes the surprising strength of remittances in Bangladesh and other countries in South Asia and the Philippines in 2009. The empirical analysis suggests that the continued strong growth of remittances in these countries is related to the resilience of non-oil GDP...

This paper investigates the asymmetries in trade spillovers from sector-specific technology shocks in China to selected euro area countries. We use a Ricardian-gravity trade model to estimate sectoral competitiveness in individual euro area countries. Simulations on the impact of productivity...

This Selected Issues paper on Bangladesh reviews institutional developments in the foreign exchange market since 2002. In 2002, there have been several aspects of the financial system and exchange market in Bangladesh that posed impediments to a floating exchange rate system. The financial...

Bangladesh’s 2008 Article IV Consultation reports that growth picked up strongly from a slow start to the year with rebounds in agriculture and garment exports playing a leading role. Strong growth of remittances and increased external assistance helped support the balance of payments in...

The current high Southern African Customs Unions revenues should be used to implement fiscal measures to secure fiscal sustainability and support economic growth. The government should formulate a financial sector strategy that addresses Swaziland’s twin challenges of enhancing financial...

This paper reports on the economic and financial reforms in Guinea-Bissau. After a long period of recession since the beginning of 2000 followed by a slight recovery in 2007, the economy of Guinea-Bissau has entered a new growth spurt in 2008. The budget deficit, which averaged 10 percent of GDP...

An influential theoretical literature has observed that economic diversification can reduce risk and increase financial development. But causality operates in both directions, as a well functioning financial system can enable a society to invest in more productive but risky projects, thereby...

Economists interested in location choices usually focus their attention on investments abroad. This neglects the fact that multinational enterprises continue to invest domestically while undertaking foreign expansion. This paper compares investments at home and abroad. Our firm-level dataset...