External Shocks and the HIPC Initiative: Impacts on Growth and Poverty in Africa

Abstract: The paper uses a simple macroeconomic model to estimate the impact of debt relief and terms of trade shocks on growth and poverty in African countries. For the 18 heavily indebted poor countries (HIPCs) that reached the enhanced HIPC decision point by end‐December 2000, the basic quantitative findings are that HIPC debt relief has boosted economic growth in these countries by an average of 2.9 percent per annum and that the computed result of this increase in growth is a reduction in poverty by an average of 2.2 percent per annum. However, the paper shows that recent deteriorations in the terms of trade have counter‐balanced these positive effects by lowering growth by an average of 2.0 percent per annum and by increasing poverty by an average of 1.3 percent per annum. Clearly, much of the positive impact emanating from the HIPC Initiative has been eroded due to recent deteriorations in the terms of trade. The paper also estimates the net effect on growth and poverty of the recently agreed 100 percent multilateral debt relief. This is predicted to boost economic growth by an average of 5 percent per annum and reduce poverty by about 5.3 percent per annum for the group of all African HIPCs. The paper concludes that 100 percent debt relief is crucial for Africa, but that more aid and policies need to be focused on a long‐term development strategy that fosters the necessary structural transformation.     

Structure of Sectoral Decomposition of Aggregate Poverty Changes in Cameroon

Abstract: This paper reviews theoretical frameworks for sectoral decomposition and assesses the within‐ and between‐sector contributions to changes in aggregate poverty in Cameroon informed by the Shapley Value decomposition rule. Between 1984 and 1996 poverty remained a rural phenomenon in Cameroon. It became more widespread, deeper and severer in both rural and urban areas, but more so in urban than rural areas. While the within‐sector effects disproportionately accounted for the increase in poverty in the period 1984–96, the between‐sector contributions in both rural and semi‐urban areas played a mitigating role on the worse effects of the increase in poverty. These findings infer the potential positive feedback effects of migration such as remittances, and/or increases in rural consumption expenditure in the face of rural underemployment, as effective strategies used by migrants to lift their families and villages out of the worse effects of poverty. The implication of this interpretation is that decision‐makers need to better understand the factors that push or pull potential migrants. Rural–urban mobility could, therefore, be viewed as a strategy used by households to moderate the worse effects of poverty and a vector of shared growth. The implications for public policy, in terms of open unemployment and associated social and insecurity problems at the receiving end, point to the wisdom of addressing the push‐factors via targeting more in favour of rural areas.     

中国经济增长的减贫效果评估

本文采用Kakwani等人提出的测度方法--减贫经济增长率,定量分析了我国20世纪80年代以来经济增长对于城乡贫困的影响.结论显示,经济增长对高阶贫困指数的影响大于低阶贫困指数,表明反贫困成本(转移支付金额)相对于贫困人口而言,对经济增长更加敏感.同时,减贫经济增长率的波动幅度要明显高于实际收入增长率,这意味着贫困人口更易受宏观经济波动的冲击.因此,保持宏观经济的稳定以及改善收入分配、加强社会保障等有利于社会公正.     

Estimating the Impact of Covid-19 on Poverty in Indonesia

Covid-19 has infected and will continue to infect millions of people all over the world. The economic impact is predicted to be large and millions of people will be pushed into poverty. In this paper, we estimate the impact of Covid-19 on poverty in Indonesia. The economic impact is expected to be severe, reducing the economic growth rate projected for 2020 from about 5% to between 4.2% and –3.5%. We find that under the best-case scenario, the poverty rate will increase from 9.2% in September 2019 to 9.7% by the end of 2020, pushing 1.3 million more people into poverty. Under the worst-case scenario, the poverty rate will increase to 16.6%, close to the level seen in 2004 when the poverty rate was 16.7%. This means that 19.7 million more people will become poor, substantially reversing Indonesia’s progress in reducing poverty. The implication is that Indonesia will need to expand its social protection programs to assist the new poor as well as the existing poor.     

General Equilibrium Approach for Poverty Analysis: With an Application to Cameroon

Abstract: In this paper we use a computable general equilibrium model to study the impact of a trade shock and a tariff reform on household poverty for an archetype developing country. Unlike other studies, we present the income distribution of each household group as a Beta statistical distribution. In contrast to other studies, this paper presents the poverty lines as being endogenous. With this specification, the poverty line will change following a variation in relative prices. With the new distributions and poverty line, the poverty levels of the base year are compared with the ex‐post values. Foster, Greer and Thorbecke's (1984) poverty measures are used. We work with the Cameroon household survey data of 1995–96. We consider two scenarios. The first is a 30 percent fall in the world price of the country's export crop and the second is a reduction of 50 percent in the country's import tariffs. For the first simulation, results indicate a drop in all household incomes and a decrease in the poverty line. Unilateral trade liberalization also has negative consequences on all household incomes. As in the first simulation, the poverty line decreases with a unilateral trade liberalization. In the trade liberalization simulation, the poverty line effect counters the income effect in most cases analyzed. In the other simulation, the poverty line effect attenuates the decrease in the poverty measures.     

Determinants of Well‐being and Poverty Changes in Cameroon: 2001–2007

Abstract: This paper identifies and decomposes sources that explain household economic well‐being in Cameroon. It uses the 2001 and 2007 Cameroon Household Consumption Surveys, synthetic variables constructed by the multiple correspondence analysis and econometric approaches that correct for potential endogeneity and unobserved heterogeneity in a step‐wise manner and simultaneously. Sources of well‐being that explain poverty are then decomposed into growth and redistribution components. Variables that significantly explain household economic well‐being are education, health, household size, fraction of active household members, working in the formal sector and area of residence. Decomposition analysis shows that the growth components largely account for changes in deprivation in terms of each regressed‐income source. With the exception of the income source education, redistribution components slowed down progress in alleviating shortfall in other regressed‐income sources. These results have implications for public interventions that affect education and health for all, labour market participation and infrastructure development.     

Rural Poverty Dynamics and Impact of Intervention Programs upon Chronic and Transitory Poverty in Northern Ethiopia*

Abstract: Using a three‐year panel data set of rural households in the Tigray region of northern Ethiopia, we examine the dynamics of poverty and the impact of two intervention measures—the food for work (FFW) and the food security package (FSP) programs—upon poverty by disaggregating total poverty into its transient and chronic components. Poverty in the region is predominantly chronic. Results of matching estimators indicate that the FSP program has a significant negative effect on total and chronic poverty, but not on transient poverty. Households involved in the program have on average lower levels of total and chronic poverty than households not involved in the program. The FFW on the other hand does not significantly influence any of the three forms of poverty. Tertile regressions, however, reveal that the FFW benefits households in the richest and the middle tertiles.     

Beyond HIPC: What are the Prospects for Debt Sustainability?

Abstract: The pronouncement by the G‐8 Summit at Gleneagles in July 2005 on debt cancellation under the HIPC Initiative, affirmed by the G‐8 Ministers of Finance in Washington in September, should signal the beginning of debt relief for the world's heavily indebted poor countries (HIPC), mostly African. It is expected that debt cancellation should return the beneficiary countries to debt sustainability and afford their governments the fiscal space to invest in basic infrastructure and social services. Countries could significantly enhance their prospects for maintaining debt sustainability mainly by adopting debt management strategies that de‐emphasize excessive borrowing, checking the expansion of unproductive public sector activities and the associated fiscal deficits, financial restructuring to reduce the bias against autonomous capital flows, and taking deliberate actions to expand exports.     

外出务工对贫困脆弱性的影响:来自西部山区农户的证据

本文从理论上研究了家庭收入来源的增加对贫困脆弱性的影响,并基于西部山区农户的调查数据对家庭外出务工收入和贫困脆弱性的关系进行了实证分析.研究发现:中国西部山区农户的外出务工收入增加可以降低因农业收入损失所导致的贫困脆弱性,但对因疾病冲击所导致的贫困脆弱性的降低没有影响.本文还发现家庭层面的社会资本可以降低贫困脆弱性,对同质风险冲击所导致的脆弱性也同样有效.     

“一带一路”倡议对中国企业投资效率的影响分析

在对“一带一路”沿线国家投资中,企业作为投资主体发挥了重要作用。采用倾向得分匹配（PSM）和双重差分法（DID）将“一带一路”倡议作为一项准自然实验,探究“一带一路”倡议是否有助于对“一带一路”沿线国家投资的企业提升投资效率。实证分析表明,“一带一路”倡议能够提高参与对沿线国家投资企业的投资效率约10个百分点。宏观分析表明创新是企业参与投资的重中之重,掌握核心技术才能够更好的提升企业投资效率;“一带一路”倡议通过提升企业的国际化经营水平、化解过剩产能的方式提升了企业投资效率。因此,“一带一路”倡议的实施有效提升了中国企业投资效率。     

Revisiting the Impact of Consumption Growth and Inequality on Poverty in Indonesia during Decentralisation

This article analyses the consumption growth elasticity and inequality elasticity of poverty in Indonesia, with a particular focus on the decentralisation period. Using provincial panel data, we show that the effectiveness of growth in alleviating poverty across provinces was greater during decentralisation—that is, between 2002 and 2010—than at any other point since 1984. The growth elasticity of poverty since 2002 is estimated to have been –2.46, which means that a 10% increase in average consumption per capita would have reduced the poverty rate by almost 25%. However, we also find that rising income inequality negated a quarter to a third of the 5.7-percentage-point reduction in the headcount poverty rate. This increasing inequality has contributed to a lower level of pro-poor growth than that maintained in Indonesia before decentralisation.     

“一带一路”沿线国家投资网络结构及其影响因素:基于ERGM模型的研究

文章利用复杂网络分析方法,构建"一带一路"沿线国家的投资网络,分别从全局和局域层面考察投资网络的拓扑结构和关系模式,采用指数随机图模型(ERGM)从内生结构效应、行动者-关系效应和协变量网络效应剖析投资网络形成的影响因素。研究表明:(1)投资网络全局结构呈现"东亚和东南亚密集、中东欧隔断和中亚游离"的格局,投资活跃度整体偏低,高介数节点集中于少数核心国家。(2)模体分析体现了互惠性在沿线国家投资关系中至关重要的作用,但该区域投资集团化特征不显著,中国和印度、新加坡和波兰具有相似的投资模式,俄罗斯主要以吸引外商投资为主。(3)国家的经济水平是影响投资网络形成的关键因子,不同经济水平的国家间投资行为差异显著,高经济水平国家之间具有相互投资倾向,高经济水平和中等经济水平的国家具有对外投资倾向。(4)资源寻求型投资和技术寻求型投资是具有网络形成的重要推力,然而市场寻求型投资的驱动力较弱,且不存在劳动力寻求型投资;空间邻近、共同语言和投资协定的签订是该区域投资网络形成和发展的重要外生力量。因此,中国要发挥在网络中的枢纽优势,遵循适度均衡化的原则,重塑沿途国家投资格局,引领未来"一带一路"沿线国家走向经济一体化。     

收入转移对中国城市贫困与收入分配的影响

本文利用14个城市调查资料的测定结果表明，中国城市贫困发生率在10鬈左右。高失业率和社会保障体系不完善是造成城市贫困问题恶化的重要原因。收入转移、特别是公共收入转移对减缓城市贫困和收入不平等具有显著作用。在快速经济转型过程中，通过扩大和促进就业、完善社会保障体系等政策措施，对治理城市贫困具有非常重要的现实意义。     

医药企业参与精准扶贫对企业绩效的影响

以2016—2019年中国沪深两市医药制造业上市公司为样本，运用多元线性回归模型分析其参与精准扶贫对企业绩效的影响。研究发现：医药企业精准扶贫投入水平越高，对企业绩效的提升越显著；政府补贴在精准扶贫投入水平与企业绩效间起负向调节作用；相较于非国有医药企业，国有医药企业提高精准扶贫投入对企业绩效的提升效果更好。研究结论丰富了精准扶贫领域的研究成果，可为后精准扶贫时代医药企业继续进行扶贫成果巩固工作提供借鉴。