This paper evaluates the effects on the Bangladeshi economy of phasing out textile and clothing (T&C) quotas currently maintained by industrial countries. The planned abolition of the quotas under the Agreement on Textiles and Clothing in 2005 will alter the competitiveness of various exporting...

This paper seeks to document key characteristics of small island states in the Pacific. It restricts itself to a limited number of indicators which are macro-orientated - population, fertility of land, ability to tap into economies of scale, income, and geographic isolation. It leaves aside...

This paper evaluates the role of trade and financial linkages in the decision to enter a monetary union. We estimate a two-country DSGE model for the U.K. economy and the euro area, and use the model to compute the welfare trade-offs from joining the euro. We evaluate two alternative scenarios....

The paper reviews and draws lessons from the experience of fast growing economies including a sub-set of these termed High Growth Economies (HGEs) with a decadal rate of over 7 per cent. It then reviews the history of the Indian growth acceleration following the reforms of the 1990s and its...

In this paper, we re-examine two important aspects of the dynamics of relative primary commodity prices, namely the secular trend and the short run volatility. To do so, we employ 25 series, some of them starting as far back as 1650 and powerful panel data stationarity tests that allow for...

The small states of the Asia and Pacific region face unique challenges in raising their growth potential and living standards relative to other small states due to their small populations, geographical isolation and dispersion, narrow export and production bases, exposure to shocks, and heavy...

We present a gravity model that accounts for multilateral resistance, firm heterogeneity and country-selection into trade, while accommodating asymmetries in trade flows. A new equation for the proportion of exporting firms takes a gravity form, such that the extensive margin is also affected by...

The “middle-income trap” is the phenomenon of hitherto rapidly growing economies stagnating at middle-income levels and failing to graduate into the ranks of high-income countries. In this study we examine the middle-income trap as a special case of growth slowdowns, which are identified as...