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Sustainable economic development has played a major role in the decline of global poverty in the past two decades. There is no doubt that competitive markets are key drivers of economic growth and productivity. They are also valuable channels for consumer welfare. Competition policy is a powerful tool for complementing efforts to alleviate poverty and bring about shared prosperity. An effective competition policy involves measures that enable contestability and firm entry and rivalry, while ensuring the enforcement of antitrust laws and state aid control. Governments from emerging and developing economies are increasingly requesting pragmatic solutions for effective competition policy implem...
Today’s middle-income countries tend to be locked in a middle-income trap, unable to transition to higher income levels due to rising costs and declining competitiveness. While there is a broad consensus that upgrading these economies towards innovation-led growth is imperative, countless institutional and political economy obstacles remain. This book brings together analytical perspectives from comparative political economy, innovation studies, and development economics for the study of technological upgrading. Its distinctive contribution is the development of an innovative theoretical framework, named upgrading regimes, combining and extending the comparative capitalism and innovation system perspectives. It explores the usefulness of this approach by providing an indepth assessment of the political economy of upgrading in Brazil under the Workers’ Party governments. As the politics of technological upgrading will be one of the crucial research areas in the years to come, this book promises to become a key reference point in this debate.
Romania identified competition as key to its effective economic development and is positioning the Competition Council to become more visible and effective. Improving Romania’s competitive environment will attract new firms, weed out inefficient ones, and enhance growth potential. An effective competition policy leads to success in the areas of Romania's domestic market efficiency, economic growth and European market integration. Following a comprehensive functional review of the Romanian Competition Council carried out by the World Bank in 2010, weaknesses, needs and priorities were identified. This book presents the results of the World Bank’s Advisory Services which were designed to p...
This book explores the contribution of competition to economic growth by way of both theoretical analysis of established growth models and empirical evidence.
Latin America and the Caribbean continues to face adverse global headwinds: high interest rates, modest G-7 growth, soft commodity prices and uncertain prospects in China will all depress growth. Well-grounded policy responses have led to largely recovering employment and income losses from the pandemic and falling rates of inflation. However, the region faces the mutually reinforcing triple challenges of low growth, limited fiscal space, and citizen dissatisfaction. Expanding digital connectivity offers a possibility to make progress on all three fronts. To maximize the social benefits of connectivity as well as to ensure that it does not exacerbate spatial, educational, gender or racial inequalities, three challenges are important to address: first, expanding coverage to the remaining unconnected areas as well as improving the quality of service; second, increasing the productive use of existing infrastructure, and; third, as with any other infrastructure "hardware," investments in "software" - such as digital and traditional skills, managerial capabilities, supportive regulatory frameworks, and deeper financial markets are critical.
This book is a multi-disciplinary exploration of the intersection, relationship, and connection between higher education, economic development, and gender in post-Apartheid South Africa. In just twenty years, South Africa has rewritten its constitution, restructured its macroeconomic growth and development policies, restructured its higher education system, and made a commitment to provide opportunity for all its citizens, specifically those who have historically been marginalized, women and blacks. Eynon weaves together these unique perspectives to illustrate how these multiple domains map onto women and the critical role they play in the present and future of the country. Gender equality and women’s empowerment and education were considered key drivers to South Africa’s transformation.
All African countries need better and more jobs for their growing populations. Digital Africa: Technological Transformation for Jobs shows that broader use of productivity-enhancing digital technologies by enterprises and households is imperative to generate such jobs, including for lower-skilled people. At the same time, broader use can support not only countries’ short-term objective of postpandemic economic recovery but also their vision of economic transformation with more inclusive growth. These outcomes are not automatic, however. Mobile internet availability has increased throughout the continent in recent years, but Africa’s uptake gap is the highest in the world. Areas with at l...
Tous les pays africains ont besoin d'avantage d'emplois de qualité pour leurs populations croissantes. Le rapport « Afrique numérique : Transformation technologique pour l’emploi » montre qu'une utilisation plus large, par les entreprises et les ménages, des technologies numériques génératrices de productivité est impérative afin de générer de tels emplois, y compris pour les personnes peu qualifiées. Dans le même temps, cette démarche peut soutenir non seulement l'objectif à court terme de reprise économique postpandémique des pays, mais aussi leur vision d'une transformation économique assortie d’une croissance plus inclusive. Cependant, ces résultats ne seront pas ...
Economic activity in much of developing East Asia and Pacific (EAP), other than several Pacific Island Countries, has recovered from the succession of shocks since 2020 but is now slowing down. Private consumption and the recovery of tourism had sustained growth in the region but is running out of steam. Slowing global growth is leading to a contraction in exports. Public investment and private investment also remain low in much of the region. Most governments in the region are projected to consolidate fiscally in 2023. The revival of growth in the region will depend crucially on the state of the services sectors. Even though manufacturing has powered EAP development, services already account for more than half of value added and employment. A digital revolution is leading to structural change within all services sectors, with the combination of new domestic platform-based services and more internationally tradable services boosting productivity. Harnessing the digital revolution for inclusive economic growth requires deeper services reforms.
Global value chains (GVCs) powered the surge of international trade after 1990 and now account for almost half of all trade. This shift enabled an unprecedented economic convergence: poor countries grew rapidly and began to catch up with richer countries. Since the 2008 global financial crisis, however, the growth of trade has been sluggish and the expansion of GVCs has stalled. Meanwhile, serious threats have emerged to the model of trade-led growth. New technologies could draw production closer to the consumer and reduce the demand for labor. And trade conflicts among large countries could lead to a retrenchment or a segmentation of GVCs. World Development Report 2020: Trading for Development in the Age of Global Value Chains examines whether there is still a path to development through GVCs and trade. It concludes that technological change is, at this stage, more a boon than a curse. GVCs can continue to boost growth, create better jobs, and reduce poverty provided that developing countries implement deeper reforms to promote GVC participation; industrial countries pursue open, predictable policies; and all countries revive multilateral cooperation.