Determinants of fertility in developing countries

The contribution of agricultural modernization to changes in fertility in developing countries was examined. A model for the determinants of both fertility and infant mortality--hypothesized to be positively related--was specified and applied to cross-sectional data for 75 developing countries for the year 1971. The infant mortality rate, productivity per unit of labor and land, and density of population for agricultural land were highly correlated with the crude birth rate. The only other exogenous variables highly correlated with each other were productivity per unit of labor and infant mortality, and productivity per unit of land and population density for agricultural areas. The coefficient of population density of agricultural areas suggested a negative impact of density on fertility. The infant mortality rate, productivity per unit of land and labor, and density of population of agricultural areas explained 85% of the intercountry variation in fertility. The infant mortality rate, productivity of land, and productivity of labor were of descending order of importance in determining the crude birth rates in the countries analyzed. 68% of the intercountry variation in infant mortality was explained by fertility, adult literacy, per capita energy consumption, gini-coefficient of income distribution, population per hospital bed, and protein supply. Adult literacy, crude birth rates, population per hospital bed, per capita energy consumption, per capita protein supply, and gini-coefficient of income distribution were of descending order of importance in determining infant mortality rates. All of the variables that affected infant mortality directly affected fertility indirectly; conversely, all the variables that affected fertility directly affected infant mortality indirectly. Overall, these results confirm that agricultural modernization does exert an effect on fertility. The task in developing countries is to break the vicious cycle of infant mortality and fertility. This can be achieved both through family planning programs and the diffusion of health programs to lower infant mortality.     

Is devaluation expansionary or contractionary: Evidence based on vector autoregression with sign restrictions

The purpose of the paper is to examine the impact of real exchange rate changes – real devaluation or real depreciation – on outputs in 16 countries that fall within one of the three groups: Latin American countries, Asian countries, and non-G3 developed countries. For the first time in the contractionary devaluation literature, the analysis is based on a Vector Autoregression (VAR) model with sign restrictions method by Uhlig (2005) and Fry and Pagan (2011). The exchange rate shock is identified by imposing restrictions on the signs of impulse responses for a small subset of variables. The findings are as follows: (1) whether output increases after a real devaluation or not has little to do with whether the current account improves or not; (2) Latin American countries are quite homogenous in that the current account generally improves while output decreases after real devaluation; and (3) contractionary devaluation could happen in developed countries as well as in developing countries.     

Surges and stops in greenfield and M&A FDI flows to developing countries: analysis by mode of entry

This paper investigates the factors associated with foreign direct investment “surges” and “stops”, defined as sharp increases and decreases, respectively, of foreign direct investment inflows to the developing world and differentiated based on whether these events are led by waves in greenfield investments or mergers and acquisitions. Greenfield-led surges and stops occur more frequently than mergers-and-acquisitions-led ones and different factors are associated with the onset of the two types of events. Global liquidity is the factor significantly and positively associated with a surge, regardless of its kind, while a global economic growth slowdown and a surge in the preceding year are the main factors associated with a stop. Greenfield-led surges and stops are more likely in low-income countries and mergers-and-acquisitions-led surges are less likely in resource-rich countries than elsewhere in the developing world. Global growth accelerations and increases in financial openness, domestic economic and financial instability are associated with mergers-and-acquisitions-led surges but not with greenfield-led ones. These results are particularly relevant for developing countries where FDI flows are the major type of capital flows and suggest that developing countries’ macroeconomic vulnerability increases following periods of increased global liquidity. As countries develop they typically become more exposed to merger-and-acquisition-led surges, which are more likely than greenfield-led surges and stops to be short-lived and associated with domestic macroeconomic policies.     

新疆人口分布与土地资源承载力协调的量化评价与分析

本文采用相对资源承载力的思路和分析方法,通过对新疆不同区域和县市人口分布与土地资源承载力的分析,得出：新疆协调较好的区域和县市占比较高;目前新疆人口土地资源承载力虽属相对富裕状态,但有趋向临界值的态势。按照发达国家的经验,随着人口增长和经济发展,人均粮食消耗量会不断增加,因此,新疆要努力提高土地产出率,控制人口增长,使社会经济协调发展。     

Empirical Evidence on Recycling and Trade of Paper and Lead in Developed and Developing Countries

In recent decades most countries have experienced substantial increases in recycling. During the same period, international trade of recyclable materials between developed countries and developing countries has also grown. Increasingly, waste materials recovered in developed countries are exported for utilization in developing countries. We investigate the causes of this trend,focusing on two materials: paper and lead. Trade patterns of these materials are analyzed for the developed and developing world. We find that countries that have actively participated in trade of recyclables have higher recycling rates than those with closed recycling systems. Other factors that contribute to the intensity of recycline are geographic and economic conditions.     

政绩压力与利益谋取 ——对农地征用中地方政府行为的理论分析

政府应该在经济发展中扮演怎样的角色是发展中国家普遍面临的问题。当前中国出现的农地征用中地方政府的积极介入行为为我们分析这个问题提供了具体的事实案例。在农地征用过程中,由于地方政府掌握着土地征用权,所以它们构成农业用地向城市用地（包括公共用地和商业用地）流转的唯一中介,从而积极地介入到土地流转的过程中。地方政府在农地征用中的权力运行有着内在的政治逻辑,这是与当前中国的政治经济体制所分不开的。地方政府积极主动介入农地征用的行为是当前压力型政治经济体制下应对自上而下的政绩压力的产物,也是地方政府谋取自身利益的必然结果。地方政府的这种行为在一定程度上为促进地方经济发展作出了贡献,但是也带来了一系列的社会问题。要促进中国经济的健康发展,就必须对这种体制进行及时主动的变革。     

经济周期波动与跨国公司投资区域分布

不同国家组群的FDI流入量与世界GDP增长率波动之间的相互关系反映了跨国公司对不同类别国家在不同经济景气阶段的投资态度。文章认为,跨国公司对发达国家具有较强的投资意愿,并且跨国公司对发达国家直接投资的意愿随经济波动状况的变化而变化。跨国公司对发展中国家、欠发达国家甚至高收入的石油国家的投资表现出明显的短期倾向和周期性,这是这些国家市场的有限性、经济对外依赖性和政府对经济的可控性差等因素对跨国公司综合影响的结果。     

Integrating tourism to rural development and planning in the developing world

In the past few decades, rural areas have experienced major socioeconomic changes. Due to modernisation and deepening globalisation, the economic and employment potential of many traditional livelihoods has decreased. Currently tourism is increasingly seen as a relevant tool for addressing rural problems in developing countries and tourism is actively used for economic diversification and opening up new ways to generate income and employment. However, many development models, such as integrated rural tourism (IRT) with emphasis on co-planning, learning and participation, originate from the Global North. This calls for careful considerations when such models are applied to the Global South's rural contexts. This research note discusses some of the key challenges of rural tourism development, especially related to the integration of the tourism industry and rural communities in developing countries, and overviews the applicability and conditions of the IRT framework as a potential approach for rural tourism development in the developing world.     

Two-way trade between unequal partners: The EU and the developing countries

Two-Way Trade between Unequal Partners: The EU and the Developing Countries. — This paper analyses the intra-industry trade specialization between the EU and the developing countries between 1980 and 1992. It shows that EU intra-industry trade with the developing countries has greatly increased and that the traditional measure of intra-industry trade, the Grubel-Lloyd index, is inappropriate when applied to trade between developed and developing countries. By and large, the empirical analysis confirms that intra-industry trade between the developed and the developing countries increases with average and per capita income, and with reduced differences in economic size and capital-labour ratios.     

A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE SYNCHRONISATION OF BUSINESS CYCLES FOR DEVELOPED AND DEVELOPING ECONOMIES WITH THE WORLD BUSINESS CYCLE

Globalisation brought about worldwide changes, including economic and financial integration between countries. The objective of this paper is to establish if there is synchronisation between developed and developing countries with the world cycle. Research results show that business cycles have become less volatile after globalisation, but there is not much consensus on whether business cycles have become less or more synchronised since globalisation. Little research has been done on co‐movement between emerging markets, such as South Africa, and the world business cycle. This paper derives common factors for developed and developing countries by applying principal component analysis (PCA) to output, consumption and investment data, which represents the countries' business cycles. The empirical analysis shows co‐movement between some countries and the world business cycle (G7 countries as proxy). The results suggest that there are idiosyncratic and globally common shocks, which play different roles over time in different countries. The paper goes on to suggest that there are clear differences in how developed and emerging markets co‐move with the world business cycle. A key finding is that the co‐movement between developing economies and the world business cycle has increased since globalisation. This research also confirms previous research that most economies follow the world business cycle when large shocks – such as the recent economic downturn – occur. This has implications for forecasting the business cycle, especially in times of economic turmoil.     

The effects of social security on population and output growth

"In this paper we have considered two unfunded social security programs. Under the conventional system, benefits are related to aggregate fertility; under the hypothetical fertility-related system, benefits are directly linked to individual fertility. The effects on fertility and per capita growth rates of the two social security systems are examined in the context of endogenous growth." The relative merits of the two systems for developing and developed countries are considered. The authors conclude that "the conventional social security system existing in many developed nations may be desirable to...developing countries in reducing population and promoting economic growth. On the other hand, the hypothetical fertility-related system may be useful to developed countries as far as increasing fertility is concerned."     

Recession, inflation and the international monetary system

The difficult circumstances being faced by the world economy and its uncertain prospects for the 1980s make it necessary to take a new look at the present financial mechanisms and international institutions for monetary cooperation, with a view to adapting them to current needs and to developments in the near future. The industrial countries will have more modest rates of growth than in earlier decades, and this will have significant consequences for the developing countries: (a) stagnation of official development aid flows; (b) possible intensification of protectionist trends; (c) slow growth of producers of raw materials whose export markets will be seriously limited; (d) gradual shift of world economic and political activity toward oil-producing developing countries and, to a lesser extent, toward the exporters of manufacturers; (e) industrial countries and raw materials producers will become increasingly interdependent; (f) oil-producing and other higher income developing countries will increase their participation in regional economic cooperation and official development aid efforts. Some of the more specific problems which require attention from the international community are inflation and recession; structural disequilibria, recycling and external debt; adjustment process; creation of liquidity and transfer of resources; and participation of the developing countries in the monetary system.     

The task ahead for the cities of the developing countries

Between 1975 and the year 2000 the cities of the developing countries will be expected to absorb 70% of the projected population increases — 1.3 billion people — most of them poor. By any measures this is a gargantuan task. This paper examines the causes for the unprecedented growth of urban areas, the magnitude of this growth, and where it is occuring. Although cities are absorbing large numbers of people, they are doing so in a manner that is both inefficient and inequitable. Few cities are prepared for the vast increases that are clearly foreseeable in the next two decades. Unless there are changes in national, regional, and urban policies, the growth of urban areas will not make its maximum possible contribution to social well-being.     

Flexible exchange rates,inflation and economic development

Different economies have different propensities to generate inflationary pressures, and different capacity to absorb the strains occasioned by price and wage increases. Because of economic and institutional features of less developed countries, expansionary policies may have to be undertaken in a ‘typical” developing country, more often and to a greater extent than in a ‘typical’ developed country. Even a mild rate of inflation will be damaging under a fixed-exchange-rate system, if domestic prices increase at a faster pace than prices abroad. Chronic balance-of-payments difficulties are confronted by inflationary countries that are attached to a fixed-exchange-rate system. Rather than sporadic, substantial devaluations, periodical mini-devaluations may be advisable in developing countries with a relatively high propensity to inflate.     

Land fragmentation and farm productivity in China in the 1990s

The main objective of this study is to examine the effects of fragmentation on farm productivity in China and to discuss policy implications. Some earlier work has questioned the importance of the economic costs of land fragmentation in developing economies. It has been argued that policymakers should focus instead on reducing the root causes of fragmentation: inefficiencies in land, labour, credit, and food markets. Our results, using a more recent and larger dataset from a household survey in China, find that fragmentation does have an economic cost in China. Production functions are estimated for each of the major grain crops in the sample provinces. We also argue that to reduce the economic costs, land consolidation in China should be undertaken with less government intervention. More attention should be given to the establishment of markets for land (or land use rights) and improvements in rural credit and grain markets.     

International comparisons of educational and economic indicators, revisited

Educational planning today, especially in developing countries, is still largely based on international comparisons of the relationship between educational and economic performance indicators in more advanced countries. In this paper we examine cross-sectional data one decade apart for a large number of countries and conclude that this relationship is very weak. In particular, enrolments in vocational schools and the number of doctors in the population, two indicators often mentioned in educational plans, vary widely from one country to another and exhibit low correlations with the other variables examined. The results of our analysis suggest caution in the use of international comparisons for analytical purposes, although it is accepted that such comparisons are difficult to resist on political grounds.     

转变经济增长方式 夯实构建和谐深圳的经济基础

过去20多年,深圳经济的增长方式带有明显的粗放型特征。随着经济的快速发展,经济增长的各种制约因素逐渐凸显出来,如剩余可开发土地只有200多平方公里,土地空间有限;能源、水资源供求缺口过大;环境承载力已严重透支;人口增长过快等。要继续促进经济持续快速健康发展,就必须努力实现经济增长方式的根本性转变。而转变经济增长方式是构建和谐深圳的主要经济途径之一。本文对此做了详细的阐述。     

COVID-19 and the intentions to migrate from developing countries: Evidence from online search activities in Southeast Asia

COVID-19 has had an enormous effect on labor markets globally. Economic restrictions, notably strict border controls and lockdowns, have led many workers to lose their jobs and forced many migrants to return to their homes or change their migration plans. While adverse effects on labor mobility are expected, variations in the prevalence of COVID-19 and governmental responses to the pandemic across countries are likely to influence workers’ intentions to migrate in different ways. To understand the effects of pandemics on the international labor supply, we explore the impact of COVID-19 and the various economic restriction policies on job search behavior by considering cases from Southeast Asian countries using the difference-in-differences (DID) approach with data from Google Trends Index (GTI). We find that the search volume of queries related to the labor market dramatically increased over time following the outbreak of COVID-19. However, we do not observe any positive impact on the search volume related to emigration, regardless of the infection control measures in the host countries. Our results imply that the job insecurity increases after the imposition of lockdown in the respective countries. On the other hand, the expectation to migrate outside of the country, which requires preparation time and incurs high costs, does not seem to have increased in developing countries.     

Air pollution and procyclical mortality: Evidence from China

There is growing evidence that in developed countries, mortality rises (falls) in economic booms (busts). However, little is known about the cyclical pattern of mortality in developing countries. Using China's city-year data, we find that the total mortality in China also exhibits procyclical fluctuations. In exploring the mechanisms, we find that air pollution is one of the reasons for procyclical fluctuations in total mortality. Specifically, economic booms lead to severe air pollution, worsening human health and thus increasing death rates. Moreover, we find that changes in lifestyles may not be an important reason for procyclical mortality in China.     

Has political risk scared mineral investment away from the deposits in developing countries?

In reply to recent assertions of a sharp diversion of metal mineral exploration and mining investment from developing to industrialized countries, the author argues that these worries are misdirected because they concentrate entirely on foreign direct investment and fail to consider the changes in other forms of mineral investments in developing countries. This paper shows that despite the political and economic changes which have diminished the willingness of multinational mining firms to undertake new traditional direct investment commitments in the Thrid World, the share of developing countries in Western World metal mineral activity is rising.