Other ESW Reports

242 items available

Permanent URI for this collection

http://hdl.handle.net/10986/2209

This includes miscellaneous ESW types and pre-2003 ESW type reports that are subsequently completed and released.

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Business Environment Reforms in Fragile and Conflict-Affected Situations: What Works and Why?

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2022) Ghossein, Tania ; Rana, Ahmed Nauraiz

Economies that are suffering from fragility, conflict and violence (three distinct yet interconnected elements of FCS) confront intractable poverty, and faltering growth – missing out on development objectives by significant margins. As the poverty rate in FCS has increased, the number of poor people in those economies has increased from 180 million to nearly 300 million – almost at par with the number of poor in non-FCS economies (which constitute 90 percent of global population). It is estimated that by 2030, two-thirds of the global poor will be concentrated in fragile states. This means that ending extreme poverty requires accelerating gains where poverty has been most intractable: in FCS. By definition, the economies concerned are often characterized by weak institutions and political instability, and lower level of private sector development to promote business-led growth. FCS economies require significant reforms to policy and delivery mechanisms along multiple dimensions to achieve growth and poverty reduction.
Missing Food : The Case of Postharvest Grain Losses in Sub-Saharan Africa

(Washington, DC, 2011-04) World Bank

Low-income, food-deficit countries have become especially concerned about the global and national food situation over the past three years. While the proximate cause of this heightened concern was the surge in food prices that began in 2006 and peaked in mid-2008, concerns remain for other reasons, among them the higher market-clearing price levels that now seem to prevail, continuing price volatility, and the risk of intermittent food shortages occurring repeatedly far into the future. For lower-income Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) countries, ongoing contributing factors include persistently low productivity, difficulty adapting to climate change, financial difficulties (inability to handle the burden of high food or fuel prices or a credit squeeze), and increased dependence on food aid. Yet there is an additional, often-forgotten factor that exacerbates food insecurity: postharvest losses (PHL). They can and do occur all along the chain from farm to fork, which reduces real income for all consumers. This especially affects the poor; as such a high percentage of their disposable income is devoted to staple foods. This report is based on the desk study undertaken by experts of the U.K. Natural Resources Institute (NRI). Data were collected by direct contact (e-mail or telephone), with authorities holding information on past and current projects; by searching the Internet for details about projects; and by reviewing published and 'gray' literature. Data were also collected from the personal experiences of the NRI review team who had worked on numerous and diverse projects to reduce grain PHL in SSA over the last 30 years and from experts in the field. These experts were identified and asked to complete a questionnaire that would draw out their experiences to indicate the weakest links in the postharvest chain, the interventions that deserve to be prioritized for future action, and those that should be avoided. Of about 40 invited respondents, a total of 20 returned completed (or partially completed) questionnaires.
How Do We Improve Public Expenditure in Agriculture?

(World Bank, 2011-03) World Bank

This paper synthesizes lessons learned from the Department for International Development-World Bank (DFID-WB) partnership, to provide guidance on ways to improve the allocation and efficiency of public spending for agricultural growth and poverty reduction. It includes lessons on how to improve data quality, the composition and impact of spending, budget execution, and the integration of off-budget expenditures. The paper synthesizes recurring lessons that have emerged from the commissioned work, to highlight key challenges that still remain to improve the efficiency of public expenditure planning and implementation in the agriculture sector, as well as offering options for improvement. The paper is accompanied by a separate document, the Agricultural Public Expenditure Reviews (AgPER) toolkit, which is a practical guide for practitioners tasked with carrying out AgPERs in the future. The paper is structured around the Budget Cycle Framework (BCF), to facilitate the identification of entry points to improve expenditure outcomes.
Practitioners' Toolkit for Agriculture Public Expenditure Analysis

(World Bank, 2011-03) World Bank

This toolkit for analyzing public expenditures in agriculture contributes to a broader effort to enhance the focus, quality, and appropriate scaling of public spending in the sector. More specifically, the toolkit has two goals: to provide checklists for practitioners conducting various kinds of agriculture public expenditure analyses, and to provide selected examples on aspects of the checklist to help guide analysis. The toolkit presents a diversity of approaches and describes experiences both positive and negative in conducting agricultural public spending analyses in different settings and with different objectives. It offers checklists of issues and options, rather than a minimum list of issues to be covered. Needs, existing work time, and budget constraints will likely drive the selection of the checklist topics to be covered in any given analysis of public expenditures. The toolkit is organized to facilitate this selectivity of topic, while maintaining a strategic perspective. The supporting examples draw on numerous analyses of public expenditures in agricultures.
Bulgaria - Administrative and regulatory barriers to business

(World Bank, 2010-11-01) World Bank

The present report on the Administrative and Regulatory Barriers to Business is part of an ongoing World Bank analytical and advisory support to the Government of Bulgaria in the area of regulatory reform. Since 2006, the World Bank has provided analytical and advisory support to the government in this area. In 2007, the Bank reviewed administrative procedures in the tourism, food, and road transportation sectors, calling for reduction and simplification of certain burdensome administrative regimes and emphasizing superfluous regulation at the municipality level. This report aims to identify ways in which Bulgaria can further remove obstacles to business regulation, recognizing that achieving pre-crisis growth levels, raising labor productivity and improving the business environment will require continued reforms to eliminate administrative and regulatory barriers to business. The report serves three purposes, such as: 1) providing the economic backdrop and comparators of Bulgaria's regulatory environment; 2) reporting on survey results including assessments by and perceptions of senior managers of Bulgarian enterprises; and 3) identifying strategic reform recommendations, including regulatory changes, institutional upgrading and capacity building, and legislative amendments.
Better Regulation for Higher Growth : Bulgaria's Business Regulation - Achievements and Recommendations

(World Bank, 2010-11-01) World Bank

Removing regulatory obstacles that create barriers to business is a major objective for economic policymakers. There is broad understanding among policymakers and development practitioners that microeconomic reforms aimed at strengthening property rights, unleashing competition, and reducing the cost of doing business are critical to creating a sound investment climate and promoting economic growth (World Bank 2004; World Bank 2005; Lewis 2004). It is also commonly agreed that these changes need to be credible and sustained for private firms to respond by increasing investment and production (World Bank 2005). This report summarizes the findings of three topical studies of the World Bank: Administrative and Regulatory Barriers to Business (volume two) studies the overall burden of regulation for companies in comparison to other new European Union (EU) peers and specifically assesses Information Technology (IT) and manufacturing companies and the role of key stakeholders. The ex-post impact assessment of the act on limiting administrative regulation and administrative control on economic activity (Volume three) makes an assessment of how the act has been enforced, identifies and estimates the impacts of the act, and provides recommendations for amendments. Reforming the regime of state fees (volume four) examines how reforms to the structure of state fees could decrease the regulatory burden for firms.
Bulgaria - Ex-post impact assessment of the act on limiting administrative regulation and administration control on economic activity

(World Bank, 2010-07-01) World Bank

The ex-post impact assessment of the Limiting Administrative Regulation and Administrative Control on Economic Activity Act (LARACEAA) is part of the World Bank's support to the Government of Bulgaria through on-going analytical and advisory work in the area of regulatory reform. The purpose of the present ex-post impact assessment of the LARACEAA is to: (i) assess how the Act has been enforced, (ii) identify and estimate the impacts of the Act, and (iii) provide recommendations for amendments to the Act. Chapter one emphasizes the importance of the Act as part of the Bulgarian Government's role in advancing regulatory reform and improving the business environment; gives the scope of the assessment and presents the sources of information utilized; and delineates general limitations of the analysis. Chapter two outlines a policy framework by discussing coherence with the Governmental and European Union (EU) policies, as well as touching upon relevant documents on regulatory reform, followed by analysis of the goal and objectives of the Act, and identification of performance indicators for the measurement of the impact of the Act. Chapter three depicts the results of the ex-post impact assessment, while the final chapter four identifies the main problem; discusses underlying drivers and effects of the problem; and proposes recommendations for amendments to the Act.
Informality in Colombia : Implications for Worker Welfare and Firm Productivity

(World Bank, 2010-03-01) World Bank

The level of informality in Colombia's labor market is high and persistent. When measuring informality of workers in terms of their contributions to health insurance and pension systems, 74.2 percent of all Colombian labor force was considered informal in 2008. The informality debate has taken on a new sense of urgency, as Colombia's robust economic growth in recent years has not led to significant declines in informality. Even during the period of high economic growth experienced between 2001 and 2007, the share of workers in the informal sector remained very high. This report presents new insights to develop a better understanding of the nature, causes, and consequences of informality and its implications for social policies. The study analyzes informality using the conceptual framework presented in the World Bank flagship study on informality (Perry et al 2007), which shows that informality in the region is a function of both exclusion and exit, with some workers and firms opting out of the formal sector based on their assessment of the relative benefits and costs of formality versus informality. The focus of this report is on exploring options to enhance worker welfare and firm productivity through access to public goods and services, including social protection and productive inputs. Hence, the report adopts definitions and measures of informality separate measures for workers and firms that directly capture the extent to which they are linked to the state and, thus, to public goods and services.
Bulgaria - Reforming the regime of states fees

(World Bank, 2009-06-01) World Bank

The Government of Bulgaria requested the World Bank to analyze the legal, institutional and administrative framework for setting state fees and provide recommendations based on good international practice. How big is the problem compared to the many other issues the government wants to reform in order to improve the business climate in Bulgaria? So far there are no comprehensive studies of the level of administrative fees in the European Union (EU) area. Such studies would be of great value to assess the magnitude of the problem. There are, however, several arguments in support of reforming the regime of state fees in Bulgaria now. Firstly, business associations in Bulgaria agree also confirmed by a recent unpublished government report - that state fees at the central level became an uncontrolled area in which authorities apply their own judgment and interests without considering the impact on businesses often to the disadvantage of the private sector. Secondly, if the Government of Bulgaria (GoB) does not curb the current regime system, then the trend of increasing state fees will continue or might even gain speed. Again, this will have a negative impact on the cost of doing business. Thirdly, a number of identified state fees are so high that they seriously harm competition by functioning as a barrier to firm entry. Fourthly, the EU requires Member States to implement a specific regime for administrative fees in the services sector by the end of 2009 and Bulgaria does not comply with that yet. A recent World Bank report for Bulgaria Investment Climate Assessment (2008) called for overall reduction of the administrative cost for businesses because Bulgaria is not competitive in this area compared to other Central and Eastern European countries. The report recommended that a strategic policy document is prepared to embrace the administration practice and provide an instrument for classification of the tariffs for the central administration service fees targeting universal reduction of the administrative cost. It also proposed that a special methodology for the classification of the tariffs for the central administrative service fees is developed. The present report is intended to support reform of the regime of state fees.
Technical Assistance and Training in Integrated Provincial Planning : Quang Nam Province, Vietnam

(Washington, DC, 2008-12) World Bank

Traditionally both national and regional development planning in Vietnam has been driven by 'top-down' Central Government social and economic targets based on limited analytical investigation. However, with the advent of the free market economy in Vietnam since the late 1980s, vigorous global economic competitiveness and Vietnam's membership to the World Trade Organization (WTO), changes in national policy in Vietnam have now required a more decentralized approach to development planning based on the preparation of integrated regional development strategies. This change in policy direction requires the application of new and innovative approaches to development planning underpinned by 'best practice' tools and techniques. This new way of planning will more effectively manage current and future investment opportunities at the provincial and regional levels in Vietnam. This report is the culmination of the findings and recommendations of the project over this three month period noting that the training program itself involved a total of 45 participants from relevant provincial government and district level authorities in Quang Nam Province (QNP). Appendix two is a list of participants. It is emphasized that the method of training adopted in this technical assistance project was very interactive, it required individual and group tasks to be completed by participants based on the organization of participants into five teams, nomination of a team leader for each team and regular presentations of team activities to the whole group throughout the training program. The program ran for a total of seven days (7-9 October 2008 and 4-6 November 2008) with a 'report back' workshop session of all participants and other provincial government officials on 7 November 2008.