This paper estimates a dynamic business growth equation on a sample of small-scale manufacturers. The results suggest that excessive labor regulation, power shortages, and problems of access to finance are significant influences on industrial growth in India. The expected annual sales growth...

Although both China and India are labor-abundant and dependant on manufactures, their export mixes are very different. Only one product-refined petroleum-appears in the top 25 products for both countries, and services exports are roughly twice as important for India as for China, which is much...

Gender disparities in small and medium-size enterprise lending exist around the world and impede the growth of millions of women-led firms. This paper examines a potential driver of these disparities: gender-biased loan officers. Officer bias is measured through a novel loan application...

This paper presents evidence on implementation of the World Bank Group and Financial Sector Reform and Strengthening Initiative "Principles for Public Credit Guarantee Schemes for Small and Medium Enterprises" . The evidence is based on a self-assessment of 60 schemes in 54 countries. Overall,...

This paper presents a new family of Stata functions devoted to small area estimation. Small area methods attempt to solve low representativeness of surveys within areas, or the lack of data for specific areas/sub-populations. This is accomplished by incorporating information from outside...

In many aid projects, monitoring and evaluation is a static exercise driven by donor reporting requirements. After project closure, there are seldom sustainable benefits of the monitoring and evaluation system. This paper examines how monitoring and evaluation can be transformed into a dynamic...

Developing country governments seek to reduce the pervasive informality of firms for multiple reasons: increasing the tax base, helping firms access formal markets and grow, increasing the rule of law, and as a means to obtain data that can be used for other government functions. However, there...

Many microenterprises in developing countries have high returns to capital, but also face risky revenue streams. In principle, equity offers several advantages over debt when financing investments of this nature, but the use of equity in practice has been largely limited to investments in much...

Business training programs in low-income settings have shown limited, if any, impacts on firm revenues and profits, particularly for female entrepreneurs. This paper uses a randomized design to compare the impacts of two types of business training programs targeting women with established small...

This paper takes stock of the empirical evidence on the financing challenges faced by small and medium enterprises, especially in developing countries. The paper first discusses the institutional constraints that impede access to finance, including the lack of reliable credit information, lack...