Publication: Belize, Right Choices Bright Future: Systematic Country Diagnostic
Loading...
Published
2016-01
ISSN
Date
2016-04-11
Author(s)
Editor(s)
Abstract
This systematic country diagnostic (SCD) discusses on Belize’s ability to promote faster poverty reduction and greater shared prosperity which will depend on how well the country deals with its main sources of vulnerability. The main areas in need of a big push that could have the highest potential impact on the twin goals are : (i) improving education and skills; (ii) addressing crime and violence; and, (iii) increasing resilience to climate change and natural disasters. Strengthening resilience to natural disasters and climate change along with improvements in the existing infrastructure in Belize are critical to support the twin goals to end extreme poverty, and promote shared prosperity in poorer segments of society. Sustainable progress towards the achievement of the twin goals of reducing poverty and boosting shared prosperity in Belize will also require prioritizing fiscal sustainability. This SCD is structured in six chapters that range from a brief description of the main features of Belize to the discussion of priorities for growth and shared prosperity. Chapter 1 presents the country context, highlighting Belize’s main features as a small upper middle income country that faces high volatility associated with its size and vulnerability to exogenous shocks. Chapter 2 discusses trends in poverty and shared prosperity. Chapters 2 through 5 discuss the main underlying factors that have been found to influence Belize’s growth performance as well as its economic, social and environmental sustainability. Each of these chapters discuss in greater detail the nature of the challenges, dig deeper into exploring the likely causes of these challenges, and identify policy areas that could be critical for boosting growth and inclusion and ensuring sustainability. These chapters also identify knowledge and data gaps on areas where new information could help strengthen a diagnosis and inform specific actions in the priority areas. The sixth and final chapter has three important and distinctive features. First, it provides a synthesis of the analysis and findings of the previous chapters. Second, it provides a discussion of the approach used to identify the priorities for action in Belize. And, third, it concludes with a discussion of the priorities to boost shared prosperity and ensure economic, social and environmental sustainability in Belize.
Link to Data Set
Citation
“Carneiro, Francisco. 2016. Belize, Right Choices Bright Future: Systematic Country Diagnostic. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/24046 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.”
Digital Object Identifier
Associated URLs
Associated content
Other publications in this report series
Journal
Journal Volume
Journal Issue
Collections
Related items
Showing items related by metadata.
Publication Belize Systematic Country Diagnostic(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2016-01-29)Belize has a rich history that dates back thousands of years. The country was first inhabited by the Mayans with records of their presence dating from 1500 BC. The first recorded European settlement was established circa 1638 by the British who called the country the Colony of British Honduras. The official name of the territory was changed from British Honduras to Belize in June 1973, and full independence was granted on September 21, 1981. There were several obstacles in the path toward independence, as illustrated by Guatemala's long-standing claim to the entire territory. It was only in November 1980, after several frustrated negotiations with Guatemala that Belizean diplomacy managed to obtain international support that led to the United Nations passing of a resolution that demanded the independence of Belize, but it was only in 1992 that Guatemala formally recognized Belize’s independence. After independence, Belize successfully implemented a development strategy which emphasized economic diversification and private sector development at a time where the terms of trade were favorable to the country. As a small, open economy, that is also extremely vulnerable to climate change and natural disasters, Belize’s ability to promote faster poverty reduction and greater shared prosperity will depend on how well the country deals with its main sources of vulnerability. In addition to weaknesses in infrastructure and in the skills of the labor force, several studies have pinpointed crime and violence and problems in the financial sector as important deterrents to growth. The analysis in this report confirms the centrality of these two factors. The predicament in the financial sector is largely driven by the small economic size of the country and the lack of competition in the banking sector, a common feature in small state economies that limits the availability of credit to small and medium enterprises. Stability issues in the sector complicate matters as these impose non-negligible risks to the health of the financial sector. On the other hand, the rise in the inflow of migrants from neighboring Central American countries with a history of crime and violence has been raised as a potential cause for high crime rates in Belize, but there is not enough evidence to substantiate that claim at this point. Policy interventions that could help halt the rise in criminality rates include ramping up the quality of education, keeping children at school, promoting education equivalency programs and job training, besides more direct approaches such as investing in safe neighborhood programs.Publication Understanding Latin America and the Caribbean’s Income Gap(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2015-07)Even nearly ten years of solid growth cannot guarantee long-term income convergence. The countries of the Latin America and Caribbean region (LAC), like other emerging economies, have benefited from a decade of remarkable growth and some income per capita convergence towards the United States and other industrialized countries. Yet, despite this recent progress, LAC still faces a significant per capita income gap with the developed world. The studies in this volume contribute to the ongoing debate on the reasons for this persistent income gap and the potential drivers of convergence, and propose some broad avenues for reform.Publication Learning from China's Rise to Escape the Middle-Income Trap : A New Structural Economics Approach to Latin America(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2012-08)This paper discusses the causes of the middle-income trap in Latin America and the Caribbean, identifies the challenges and opportunities for Latin America that come from China's rise, and draws lessons from New Structural Economics and the Growth Identification and Facilitation Framework to help Latin America escape the middle-income trap. Countries in Latin America and the Caribbean are caught in a middle-income trap due to their inability to structurally upgrade from low value-added to high value-added products. Governments in Latin America and the Caribbean should intervene in industries in which they have a comparative advantage, calibrating supporting policies in close collaboration with the private sector through public-private sector alliances. Through continuous structural upgrading in sectors intensive in factors such as natural resources, scientific knowledge, and unskilled labor, the region could achieve dynamic growth. This would require investments in education, research and development, and physical infrastructure. Therefore, industrial upgrading and diversification would be essential to avoid further de-industrialization arising from the competitive pressures of the rise of China, broaden the base for economic growth, and create the basis for further sustained reduction in unemployment, poverty and income inequality. Failure to do so would lead to a loss of competitiveness and risks of further de-industrialization.Publication The Middle-Income Trap Turns Ten(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2015-08)Since we introduced the term “middle-income trap” in 2006, it has become popular among policy makers and researchers. In May 2015, a search of Google Scholar returned more than 3,000 articles including the term and about 300 articles with the term in the title. This paper provides a (non-exhaustive) survey of this literature. The paper then discusses what, in retrospect, we missed when we coined the term. Today, based on developments in East Asia, Latin America, and Central Europe during the past decade, we would have paid more attention to demographic factors, entrepreneurship, and external institutional anchors. We would also make it clearer that to us, the term was as much the absence of a satisfactory theory that could inform development policy in middle-income economies as the articulation of a development phenomenon. Three-quarters of the people in the world now live in middle-income economies, but economists have yet to provide a reliable theory of growth to help policy makers navigate the transition from middle- to high-income status. Hybrids of the Solow-Swan and Lucas-Romer models are not unhelpful, but they are poor substitutes for a well-constructed growth framework.Publication Macedonia - Moving to Faster and More Inclusive Growth : A Country Economic Memorandum - Overview(World Bank, 2009-06-06)This report deals with medium and long-term growth issues rather than the challenges posed by the world financial crisis, the structural policy options presented in the report become even more important in that context, and can help to partially mitigate the impact of the crisis on Macedonia. Section B looks at poverty and inequality issues. Section C examines Macedonia's past growth in terms of total factor productivity analysis, drawing the connection with labor and capital, and within these broad factors, human capital and infrastructure. It also compares Macedonia's growth to a successful regional comparator, Slovakia. Section D benchmarks Macedonia's performance in important policy areas that could affect growth relative to comparator countries. It also estimates how much improved performance in these areas could raise potential growth. Section E looks at efficiency in public expenditure and public investment important issues in raising growth. Section F summarizes these analyses and makes some initial recommendations.
Users also downloaded
Showing related downloaded files
No results found.