Narrow Your Choices

Refine By Countries

Refine By Series

Refine By Language

Refine By Date

—

Refine By IMF Taxonomy

Refine By JEL Taxonomy

Refine by LOC Taxonomy

Refine By THEMA Taxonomy

  • Print
  • Save

Business and Economics > Production and Operations Management

You are looking at 1 - 6 of 6 items for :

  • Type: Journal Issue x
  • Ethiopia, The Federal Democratic Republic of x
Clear All Modify Search
Cover IMF Working Papers
On the Capacity to Absorb Public Investment: How Much is Too Much?
Daniel Gurara
,
Mr. Kangni R Kpodar
,
Mr. Andrea F Presbitero
, and
Dawit Tessema
While expanding public investment can help filling infrastructure bottlenecks, scaling up too much and too fast often leads to inefficient outcomes. This paper rationalizes this outcome looking at the association between cost inflation and public investment in a large sample of road construction projects in developing countries. Consistent with the presence of absorptive capacity constraints, our results show a non-linear U-shaped relationship between public investment and project costs. Unit costs increase once public investment is close to 10% of GDP. This threshold is lower (about 7% of GDP) in countries with low investment efficiency and, in general, the effect of investment scaling up on costs is especially strong during investment booms.
Keywords:
WP; marginal cost; cost function; public investment; investment drive; investment program; investment acceleration; portfolio mix; investment inefficiency; Public investment spending; Public investment and public-private partnerships (PPP); Absorptive capacity; Capacity utilization; Infrastructure; Global; Unit costs; Investment efficiency
Cover IMF Working Papers
Losing to Blackouts: Evidence from Firm Level Data
Daniel Gurara
and
Dawit Tessema
Many developing economies are often hit by electricity crises either because of supply constraints or lacking in broader energy market reforms. This study uses manufacturing firm census data from Ethiopia to identify productivity losses attributable to power disruptions. Our estimates show that these disruptions, on average, result in productivity losses of about 4–10 percent. We found nonlinear productivity losses at different quantiles along the productivity distribution. Firms at higher quantiles faced higher losses compared to firms around the median. We observed patterns of systematic shutdowns as firms attempt to minimize losses.
Keywords:
WP; production function; productivity loss; Power disruption; Shutdowns; time index; productivity shock; firms shutdown; grid-power consumption; firm age; panel data; state utility company; Productivity; Total factor productivity; Electricity; Labor productivity; Capacity utilization; Sub-Saharan Africa; Africa
Cover IMF Working Papers
Joining the Club? Procyclicality of Private Capital Inflows in Low Income Developing Countries
Mr. Antonio David
,
Carlos van Hombeeck
, and
Mr. Chris Papageorgiou
Using a newly developed dataset this paper examines the cyclicality of private capital inflows to low-income developing countries (LIDCs) over the period 1990-2012. The empirical analysis shows that capital inflows to LIDCs are procyclical, yet considerably less procyclical than flows to more advanced economies. The analysis also suggests that flows to LIDCs are more persistent than flows to emerging markets (EMs). There is also evidence that changes in risk aversion are a significant correlate of private capital inflows with the expected sign, but LIDCs seem to be less sensitive to changes in global risk aversion than EMs. A host of robustness checks to alternative estimation methods, samples, and control variables confirm the baseline results. In terms of policy implications, these findings suggest that private capital inflows are likely to become more procyclical as LIDCs move along the development path, which could in turn raise several associated policy challenges, not the least concerning the reform of traditional monetary policy frameworks.
Keywords:
WP; capital flow; business cycle; dependent variable; capital control; Capital Flows; Cyclicality; Low-Income Developing Countries; Emerging Markets; flows to LIDCs; relative to EMs; LIDCs relative; a number of LIDCs; FDI capital flow; EMs shock; potential GDP; EMs relative to LIDCs; volatile capital flow; Capital inflows; Private capital flows; Output gap; Terms of trade; Global
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
The Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia: Selected Issues and Statistical Appendix
International Monetary Fund
This Selected Issues paper assesses the implications of a significant increase in the flow of external financing and grants on real GDP growth in Ethiopia. The paper presents an analysis of the sources of growth during 1991/92–2003/04, as well as an assessment of potential GDP growth. The paper also seeks to assess the historical relationship between foreign aid and the performance of the external sector in Ethiopia to establish whether foreign aid inflows have had an adverse effect on the tradable goods sector in the past.
Keywords:
ISCR; CR; goods; potential GDP; appreciation; government; nontradable goods; regime; private sector development; tradable goods sector; trend capital-output ratio; merchandise export; Derg regime; Commercial banks; State-owned banks; Budget planning and preparation; Loans; Europe; Middle East; Eastern Europe; Western Hemisphere; Central Asia; Global
Cover IMF Working Papers
Institutions Rule: The Primacy of Institutions over Integration and Geography in Economic Development
Mr. Arvind Subramanian
,
Mr. Francesco Trebbi
, and
Mr. Dani Rodrik
We estimate the respective contributions of institutions, geography, and trade in determining cross-country income levels using recently developed instruments for institutions and trade. Our results indicate that the quality of institutions "trumps" everything else. Controlling for institutions, geography have at best weak direct effects on incomes, although it has a strong indirect effect through institutions. Similarly, controlling for institutions, trade has a negative, albeit, insignificant direct effect on income, although trade too has a positive effect on institutional quality. We relate our results to recent literature, and where differences exist, trace their origins to choices on samples, specification, and instrumentation.
Keywords:
WP; least squares; standard deviation; dependent variable; AJR sample; coefficient estimate; Institutions; integration; geography; development; income level; country's price level; GDP share; Personal income; Productivity; Purchasing power parity; Sub-Saharan Africa; Western Europe; Africa; Asia and Pacific; East Asia
Cover IMF Working Papers
Export Orientation and Productivity in Sub-Saharan Africa
Ms. Catherine A Pattillo
and
Mr. Taye Mengistae
Analysis of firm-level panel data from three sub-Saharan African economies shows that exporting manufacturers have a total factor productivity premium of 11-28 percent. The data do not allow testing of whether these premiums are caused by selection of more efficient producers into exporting or by learning-by-exporting. By thinking about the mechanisms behind selectivity and learning, however, our finding of higher premiums for direct exporters and exporters to outside Africa could be interpreted as being consistent with learning-by-exporting effects. However, if learning-by-exporting is indeed present in the data, we cannot disentangle its effect on productivity from those of more traditionally recognized channels of international technology diffusion.
Keywords:
WP; productivity premium; firm age; firms export; Ethiopian firm; productivity equation; Exports; productivity; Africa; learning-by-exporting; direct exporter; Imports; Total factor productivity; Sub-Saharan Africa