After they achieved 2.2 percent growth in 2011, early indications are that the economies of the six countries in South East Europe (the SEE6: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina (BIH), Kosovo, FYR Macedonia, Montenegro, and Serbia) are slowing drastically and can expect just 1.1 percent growth in...

Key economic variables in Cote d'Ivoire vary widely from their long-run trends, moving in multi-year cyclical patterns. Cocoa prices move with cycles in growth rates, capital stock, real exchange rates, terms of trade, cocoa production, and coffee production and output. These patterns have...

This note presents the results of an empirical analysis of firm-level productivity growth in Russia's manufacturing sector during the period 2003-08 using a rich Amadeus database as well as the recent EBRD/World Bank Business Enterprise and Performance surveys (BEEPs). The results show that...

The principal focus in the substantial literature on impediments to economic development has been on the inadequacies of policies and governance. However, successful economic development requires effectiveness of markets and incentives for investment, which in turn require trust. This paper...

On July 1, 2013, Croatia became the 28th member of the European Union. This achievement crowned more than a decade of macroeconomic and institutional reforms by the Croatian authorities and other stakeholders that yielded important development results. Croatia's institutions are now stronger...

Russia entered the global crisis with strong fiscal position, low public debt, and large fiscal and monetary reserves, which helped it cushion the crisis shocks. But the rise in the non-oil fiscal deficit in 2007-08 and, more importantly, the massive impact of the global crisis in late 2008 and...

The papers in the present SUERF Study is a selection of the papers presented at a SUERF Workshop and Special OeNB East Jour Fixe held at Oesterreichische Nationalbank in Vienna on 23 January 2009. In his opening remarks (chapter 2), Ewald Nowotny, Governor of the Oesterreichische Nationalbank...

The paper provides three principal results. First, we benchmark South African infrastructure performance in terms of access, pricing, and quality against key comparator groups of countries using the most recent World Bank benchmarking data base (2005). Second, we establish clear empirical links...

Meeting government revenue needs without inhibiting private sector development is a key challenge of tax policy during the transition from the socialist system. The paper explores issues in the design of tax bases and tax structures in the transition and argues that transition economies would...