It has been more than two decades since the widespread initiation of global power sector reforms and restructuring. However, empirical evidence on the intended microeconomic, macroeconomic, and quality-related impacts of reforms across developing countries is lacking. This paper comprehensively...

Improving access to affordable and reliable energy services for cooking is essential for developing countries in reducing adverse human health and environmental impacts hitherto caused by burning of traditional biomass. This paper reviews empirical studies that analyze choices of fuel and...

The authors create a standards restrictiveness index using newly available data on maximum residue levels of pesticides for 61 importing countries. The paper analyzes the impact that food safety standards have on international trade of agricultural products. The findings suggest that more...

Using an empirical model, this study provides some insights into the functioning of the oilseed-biodiesel-diesel market complex in a large country that determines the biodiesel price, reflecting market equilibrium changes resulting from volatility in the crude oil price. Oilseed crushing...

One key contentious issue in climate change negotiations is the huge difference in carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions per capita between more advanced industrialized countries and other nations. This paper analyzes the costs of reducing this gap. Simulations using a global computable general...

This paper evaluates the impact of foreign aid to five service sectors (transportation, information and communications technologies, energy, banking/financial services, and business services) on exports of downstream manufacturing sectors in developing countries. To address the reverse causality...

This paper proposes a new framework to analyze aid effectiveness. Using World Bank firm survey data and OECD aid flow data, the authors analyze whether aid targets areas that firms in developing countries have identified as obstacles for their growth and whether aid actually improves firms'...

Since 2005, donors and development agencies have increased the overall value of aid for trade and put in place several mechanisms to channel such aid and to ensure that it targets national priorities. This paper reviews recent trends in the allocation of aid for trade and analyses of its...

The authors estimate the impact of aggregate indicators of "soft" and "hard" infrastructure on the export performance of developing countries. They build four new indicators for 101 countries over the period 2004-07. Estimates show that trade facilitation reforms do improve the export...

The "distance effect" measuring the elasticity of trade flows to distance has been rising since the early 1970s in a host of studies based on the gravity model, leading observers to call it the "distance puzzle" . This paper reviews the evidence and explanations. Using an extensive data set of...