The availability of windfall revenues from natural resource exports or foreign aid potentially weakens governments' incentives to design efficient tax systems. Cross-country data for developing countries provide evidence for this hypothesis, using a World Bank indicator of quot;efficiency of...

In many developing countries, achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by 2015 will require significant increases in expenditures on social services and in foreign assistance. It will also require careful planning of the sector allocation and sequencing of public spending. Especially...

To utilize public resources efficiently, it is required to take full advantage of competition in public procurement auctions. Joint bidding practices are one of the possible ways of facilitating auction competition. In theory, there are pros and cons. It may enable firms to pool their financial...

Infrastructure is the engine for economic growth. The international donor community has spent about 70-100 billion U.S. dollars on infrastructure development in developing countries every year. However, it is arguable whether these financial resources are used efficiently, particularly whether...

Trade can be a key driver of growth for African countries, as it has been for those countries, particularly in East Asia, that have experienced high and sustained rates of growth. Economic partnership agreements with the European Union could be instrumental in a competitiveness framework, but to...

The inflow of large quantities of foreign aid into Rwanda since 1994 can have potential adverse effects such as aid dependency via a significant negative effect on tax efforts and on public investments. This paper carries out a theoretical and empirical study to examine these issues. The...

In recent years donor countries have committed to dramatic increases in the supply of foreign aid to developing countries. Meeting and sustaining such commitments will require sufficient support among donor country voters and taxpayers. The determinants of public opinion in donor countries on...

The outlines of a potential agreement, emerging after seven years of negotiations, imply that Doha offers three key benefits: reduced uncertainty of market access in goods and services; improved market access in agriculture and manufacturing; and the mobilization of resources to deal with the...

Devarajan, Go, Page, Robinson, and Thierfelder argued that if aid is about the future and recipients are able to plan consumption and investment decisions optimally over time, then the potential problem of an aid-induced appreciation of the real exchange rate (Dutch disease) does not occur. In...

Based on a literature review and expert interviews, this paper analyzes the most important climate impacts on development goals and explores relevant institutions in the context of mainstreaming climate adaptation into development assistance in Mozambique. Climate variability and change can...