"Four West African nations have demanded that the World Trade Organization's Doha Development Agenda include a Cotton Initiative that involves two issues: cutting cotton subsidies and tariffs, and assisting farm productivity growth in Africa. The authors provide estimates of the potential...

"Subsidies to residential utility customers are popular among policymakers, utility managers, and utility customers alike, but they are nonetheless the subject of much controversy. Utility subsidies are seen as a way to help make utility service affordable for poor households and as an...

"Large and sustained differences in economic performance across regions of developing countries have long provided motivation for fiscal incentives designed to encourage firm entry in lagging areas. But empirical evidence in support of these policies has been weak at best. The authors undertake...

"The provision of public goods and the amelioration of market failure are the classical justifications for government intervention in the economy. In reality, (1) governments intervene in markets that are not affected by failure, and (2) a large share of the government resources is spent in...

"This is one of 10 studies for the Copenhagen Consensus Project that sought to evaluate the most feasible opportunities to improve welfare globally and alleviate poverty in developing countries. Anderson argues that phasing out distortionary government subsidies and barriers to international...

Since the 1990s, most states in Europe and Central Asia (ECA) have embarked on energy sector reforms. These have included removing subsidies, which has resulted in increased end-user costs for energy. The research presented here comprises an integral part of a set of qualitative studies on...

This toolkit aims to help World Bank task teams working on energy subsidy and tariff reforms to develop qualitative analysis tools. The tools that are described in this document can help task teams to better understand and address social and political challenges related to these reforms,...