Person:
Coulibaly, Souleymane
Author Name Variants
Fields of Specialization
Macroeconomic and structural policies,
Growth diagnostics,
Fiscal policy
Degrees
Departments
Central Africa Unit, Africa Region, The World Bank
Externally Hosted Work
Contact Information
Last updated
January 31, 2023
Biography
Souleymane Coulibaly, from Cote d'Ivoire, holds a double Ph.D. degree in International Trade and Economic Geography from the University of Paris 1 Pantheon-Sorbonne (France) and the University of Lausanne (Switzerland). His publications and ongoing research deal with the impact of geography on firms’ location, trade flows and regional integration. He was a co-author of 2009 World Development Report "Reshaping Economic Geography", contributed to the 2005 Global Economic Prospect report on regionalism, and recently published the book “Eurasian Cities: New Realities along the Silk Road” in the ECA regional studies series. He is the Program Leader and Lead Economist for Central Africa. He joined the World Bank Africa Region in January 2014 from the Operation and Policy and Quality Unit (OPCS) where he was covering Development Policy Lending and Guarantee policies and operations, and represented the unit in the Non-Concessional Borrowing Policy committee. Before OPCS, he was in the Eastern and Central Asia (ECA) region working simultaneously as trade economist and country economist of some former Soviet countries (Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan), as well as ECA regional trade coordinator. Before joining the World Bank as a Young Professional in September 2006, he used to be lecturer at the Ecole Nationale Superieure de Statistiques et d’Economie Appliquée (ENSEA) of Abidjan, teaching assistant at the University of Lausanne, and economist at the Economic and International Relations department of NESTLE in Vevey, Switzerland.
Publication Search Results
1 - 6 of 6
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Publication
Rethinking the Form and Function of Cities in Post-Soviet Countries
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2012-12)Eurasian cities, unique in the global spatial landscape, were part of the world's largest experiment in urban development. The challenges they now face because of their history offer valuable lessons to urban planners and policymakers across the world from places that are still urbanizing to those already urbanized. Today, Eurasian cities must respond to three big changes: the breakup of the Soviet Union, the return of the market as the driving force of society, and the emergence of regional powers such as the European Union, China, and India that are competing with the Russian Federation for markets and influence in its former satellites. Several methods of analysis indicate an imbalance across Eurasia, implying a need to readjust Eurasia's urban structure. National policies in Eurasia are still preoccupied with spatial equity. But the concentration of economic activity in large cities is fundamental to national competitive advantage: they foster innovation through their diversity of industries -- and reduce production costs through their economies of scale. This paper suggests some ideas on how policymakers can harness the economic power of cities to drive national economic development, by focusing on four themes: planning, connecting, greening, and financing cities. -
Publication
Solow in Transition : Macro and Micro Determinants of Savings in Armenia
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2013-07)This paper analyzes and reconciles macro and micro evidence on savings and factors that affect savings, as well as possible policy implications. At the aggregate level, the main question is how savings are affected by growth and macroeconomic policies and variables (fiscal policy, exchange rate, for example) and the breadth of financial markets. Some of these macro determinants can be reconciled with microeconomic evidence of the savings behavior of households. Using macroeconomic quarterly data and household survey data, the analysis explores the determinants of the savings rate at the macroeconomic and microeconomic levels, using the typical econometric models used in the literature (long-term co-integration relation and short-term error correction model for the macro determinants; linear multivariate models for the micro determinants). The long-term relationship indicates that a 10-percent increase in gross domestic product per capita would add 3.7 percentage points to the savings rate in the long run. The short-term relationship depicts a strong catch-up process to the long-run equilibrium, with quarterly changes in gross domestic product per capita and openness strongly correlated with quarterly changes in the savings rate. The characteristics of households that represent the volatility of expected income, such as education and access to borrowing or remittances, significantly impact saving rates. The macroeconomic and microeconomic analyses of the determinants of saving rates in Armenia point to three policy areas: the macroeconomic environment, the financial sector, and the role of remittances. -
Publication
Cities as Drivers of Growth along the Silk Road
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2013-01)Major events have reshaped the internal population flows of Eurasia, including the breakup of the Soviet Union, the development of market economies, and the rising influence of regional powers. Looking ahead, policy makers need to promote reforms to make Eurasian cities the main drivers of growth. This can be done by rethinking strategies to better plan, connect, and green the region s important urban centers. Improved planning means promoting policies to develop land and housing markets and enhance public service delivery. Greening Eurasian cities refers to ensuring their sustainable development through strong markets and institutions that encourage the efficient use of resources, address pollution, and build livable cities. To appropriately fund these needed changes, subnational finances will have to be reformed and new ways to finance cross-country connectivity explored. -
Publication
Urbanization and Productivity : Evidence from Turkish Provinces Over the Period 1980-2000
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2007-08)Since the early 1980s, Turkey has been going through a rapid urbanization process at a pace beyond the World average. This paper aims at assessing the impact of this rapid urbanization process on the country's sector productivity. The authors built a database combining two-digit manufacturing data and some geographical, infrastructural, and socio-economic data collected at the provincial level by the Turkish State Institute of Statistics. The paper develops a parsimonious econometric relation linking sector productivity to accessibility, localization, and urbanization economies, proxying variables in the tradition of the New Economic Geography literature. The estimation results suggest that both localization and urbanization economies, as well as market accessibility, are productivity-enhancing factors in Turkey, although the causation link between productivity and these agglomeration measures is not clearly established. The sector-by-sector estimation confirms this result, although the localization economies effect is negative for the non-oil mineral sector, and the urbanization economies effect is weak for natural-resource-based sectors such as the wood and metal industry. Although the data cover the period up to 2000 and thus ignore the financial crisis that hit Turkey in 2001, the current structural transformation of the country away from the agricultural sector gives room to use the insights of these results as a preliminary step to understand the new challenges faced by the Turkish manufacturing sector. The results provide a discussion base to revisit the policy agenda on the improvement of the accessibility to markets, the improvement of the business environment to ease the creation and development of new firms, and a well-managed urbanization process to tap in the economic potential of cities. -
Publication
Reinvigorating Growth in Resource-Rich Sub-Saharan Africa
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2018-09)The strong economic performance of Sub-Saharan Africa’s resource-rich countries since the start of the 21st century has been celebrated as a return to more buoyant growth and renewed convergence with the advanced economies.Despite the recent progress in improving living standards and reducing poverty, achieving high and sustainable growth continues to be the main challenge for policymakers.Rwanda and Ethiopia have led Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) in terms of per-capita growth since 2000, growing faster than South Asia. However, the gap between the resource-rich countries of Africa with East Asia and the Pacific (EAP), SAR, and the advanced economies has widened since 2010, underlining the difficulty of accelerating growth.Africa has often been portrayed as a continent of boundless natural riches that have helped pull the whole subcontinent forward. Indeed, resource-rich Africa accounts for a dominant part of SSA’s economy. Resource-rich SSA accounts for 70 percent of both the subcontinent’s GDP and physical capital, 60 percent of its natural capital, and nearly 40 percent of its population. For the continent in aggregate and in per capita terms, however, natural resources are just a bit higher than in the South Asia Region (SAR) and lag all other developing regions.One way of thinking of strengthening economic growth depends on more exploration and development of natural resources that should help increase the continent’s natural wealth, as has happened in many other developing regions.More importantly, durable prosperity in resource-rich Africa depends on building up the assets, or components of overall wealth, that are in relatively short supply. In recent years, the literature has started to focus on assets and assets diversification as a path to development, and the World Bank has led in this area. In this report, we emphasize the two complementary types of assets that Africa’s resource-rich countries need to build up to accelerate growth: one is within national borders and the other across borders. -
Publication
Diversified Urbanization: The Case of Côte d'Ivoire
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2016-08-29)Côte d’Ivoire seeks a development strategy to reach middle-income status—a challenge that would require annual growth rates averaging 10 percent over the next 13 years. Global experience of both developed and emerging economies shows that GDP per capita rises with increased urbanization. However, Côte d’Ivoire’s economy is underperforming relative to its level of urbanization. The country’s urbanization has been negatively correlated with income per capita since the late 1970s, and poverty has been increasing. Rather than consider development of cities individually, successful urbanization plans in Côte d’Ivoire should consider the country’s cities as a portfolio of assets, each differentiated by characteristics that include size, location, and density of settlements. The authors of Diversified Urbanization: The Case of Côte d’Ivoire identify three types of cities on the basis of their contribution to growth and job creation: Global Connectors, Regional Connectors along major corridors for regional transport and trade, and Domestic Connectors of localization economies for agribusiness. Stakeholders from the national government, local governments, and the private sector have a shared vision for urbanization in the country—cities that are planned, structured, competitive, attractive, inclusive, and organized around development poles. To achieve this vision and the goal of middle-income status, Ivorian policy makers need to act urgently to support diversified urbanization across all city types. This book identifies important constraints and opportunities along four dimensions: planning, connecting, greening, and financing cities.