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The last fifteen years have seen Armenia emerge from Soviet rule and a severe economic and energy crisis, both complicated by its newfound political surroundings. The last ten years have seen significant reform and progress in the power sector which, when compared to the progress made by its neighbors, is all the more remarkable. The benefits of reform have not been easily won, however, and Armenia's success is a tribute to its ability to learn from mistakes and persevere. A combination of improper planning and bad fortune forced the Government of Armenia to go through three separate tenders f.
Poorly implemented energy subsidies are economically costly to taxpayers and damage the environment. This book aims to provide lessons from a sample of twenty case studies to help policymakers address implementation challenges and overcome political economy and affordability constraints.
Energy subsidies are aimed at protecting consumers, however, subsidies aggravate fiscal imbalances, crowd out priority public spending, and depress private investment, including in the energy sector. This book provides the most comprehensive estimates of energy subsidies currently available for 176 countries and an analysis of “how to do” energy subsidy reform, drawing on insights from 22 country case studies undertaken by the IMF staff and analyses carried out by other institutions.
Empirical insights on household behavior and electricity consumption patterns in this book reveal that, in Europe and Central Asia, the erosion of tariff based subsidies has disproportionately affected the poor, while direct transfers through social benefit systems have often been inadequately targeted. The book suggests alternative strategies for achieving cost-recovery in the electricity sector in a socially and politically acceptable manner, providing lessons that are equally relevant for other utilities and regions.
This report attempts to project the balance between energy demand and supply for the 48 regional members of the Asian Development Bank. However, due to the unavailability of energy data, the Marshall Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia, and Tuvalu are not included in the study. The outlook results are presented by member, by subregion, and by region. Based on the projected energy demand and supply, carbon dioxide emissions and investment requirements are derived. These will offer a basis for policy making and development planning geared toward sustainable economic development in the regional members in Asia and the Pacific.
This study analyzes the impacts of the financial crisis on power sectors in five countries in the region: Armenia, Kyrgyz Republic, Romania, Serbia and Ukraine. Before the financial crisis, these countries faced expected power shortages as a result of large investment gaps. With the financial crisis, GDP dropped, leading to a drop in demand for electricity. The drop in demand created a window of opportunity for meeting investment needs, but the crisis has limited the sources of financing available to the sector. In the post-crisis period, the study concludes that policymakers need to prioritize public spending and create a legal and regulatory environment more conducive to private investment.
Unintentional implicit subsidies (hidden costs) to public utilities can be considered an illegitimate claim on public resources. This paper examines the role and sources of hidden costs in the energy and water sectors in the Europe and Central Asia (ECA) region. It reviews available data and introduces a model-the Hidden Costs Calculator-that can be used to quantify the burden on governments of infrastructure policy and implementation decisions. This simple-to-apply model provides insight into three key components of hidden costs that affect infrastructure-poor bill collection rates, excessive losses due to inefficient operations or theft from the networks, and tariffs set below cost-recover...
This study examines the fiscal, efficiency, social, and environmental impact of power sector reforms in seven countries in Europe and central Asia (covering Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Hungary, Kazakhstan, Moldova and Poland). It includes a CD-ROM containing a pdf of this publication in Russian, plus pdfs of English and Russian versions of the following related titles: i) Utility pricing and the poor: lessons from Armenia; ii) Coping with the cold: heating strategies for eastern Europe and central Asia's urban poor; and iii) Revisiting reform in the energy sector: lessons from Georgia.