Exports respond unpredictably to a change in real exchange rates, suggests evidence from the 1980s. Recent theoretical work explains this as a consequence of the sunk costs associated with breaking into foreign markets. Sunk costs include the cost of packaging, upgrading product quality,...

This report aims to synthesize the results of a crop water use study conducted by country teams of the GEF/World Bank project, Regional Climate, Water, and Agriculture: Impacts on and Adaptation of Agro-ecological Systems in Africa. It also presents the results of the second phase of the study...

Two Colombian irrigation projects are studied in this report, the Coello and RUT projects. Management of the RUT project is going to be transfered soon from public managers to farmers. The Coello project has been farmer managed for about 13 years. The keys to its success have been: 1) the...

Both public, and private resources contribute to children's nutritional status. And investments by one household may improve health in other neighborhood households, by improving the sanitation environment, and increasing shared knowledge. The authors measure the externalities of investments in...

This report directly provide recommendations for improvement of the quality of the regional master socio-econsomic development plan and national laud use plans for Vietnam, to the year 2020. It provides analysis and assessment of the reviewed-adjusted-ammended socio-economic development plan for...

The author argues that efficient solutions to environmental problems are a means of improving a country's economic growth prospects and that policies to improve economic growth prospects will help environmental problems be addressed. Among other points he makes: The costs of avoiding pollution...

Although, in the course of development some features of the environment in developing countries may get worse, in the longer run they will be able to reverse trends in more common forms of air pollution and to attain levels of water supply and sanitation essential to an acceptable, healthy...

Projects and reforms targeting infrastructure services can affect consumer welfare through changes in the price, coverage, or quality of the services provided. The benefits of improved service quality-while significant-are often overlooked because they are difficult to quantify. This paper...

The author evaluates the strength of the effect that community pressure and pollution charges have on industrial pollution control in China, and estimates the marginal cost of pollution abatement. He examines a well-documented set of plant-level data, combined with community-level data, to...

The authors start from the premise that governments act as agents of the public in regulating pollution, using the instruments at their disposal. But when formal regulatory mechanisms are absent or ineffective, communities will seek other means of translating their preferences into reality....