We argue in this paper that cancelling the debt of the poorest countries was a good thing, but that it should not imply that the debt instrument should be foregone. Debt and debt cancellations are indeed two complementary instruments which, if properly managed, perform better than either loans...

L'année 2012 a vu se fêter les anniversaires des « quarante ans de la Zone franc », des cinquante ans de la Banque Centrale des Etats de l'Afrique de l'Ouest (BCEAO) et des quarante ans de la Banque des Etats de l'Afrique Centrale (BEAC), venant eux-mêmes après dix ans de la Banque...

Les incertitudes de la situation économique mondiale, les difficultés de l'Afrique centrale dues à la baisse du prix du pétrole, les progrès de l'intégration commerciale en Afrique de l'Ouest suscitent une nouvelle réflexion sur l'avenir de la Zone franc. Celle-ci a plus de cinquante...

There is a major need of regional integration in Africa, largely recognized by the African countries themselves and the international community as well. Meeting this need is a priority for the ADB. Although significant progress has been made by the ADB to support regional integration in FAD...

State fragility is a concept that emerged among the international community of donors in order to adapt aid policies to particularly difficult situations. Fragility has thus been measured to design a special treatment in favour of fragile states, otherwise lef t behind. In this context, but...

The African Development Bank allocates its concessional resources through a procedure which is mainly based on the quality of the beneficiary countries' economic policy and governance. This allocation procedure relies mainly on the Performance-Based Allocation formula which can be criticized on...

This paper considers why and how the Performance Based Allocation (PBA) used in multilateral development banks and in particular at IDA, could be improved by taking the structural handicaps of eligible countries into account. The PBA relies on a debatable definition of performance. It does not...