Has the WTO’s Aid for Trade Initiative Delivered on Its Promise of Greater Mobilization of Development Aid in Favor of the Trade Sector in Developing Countries?

2019 ◽  
Vol 33 (6) ◽  
pp. 519-541 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sèna Kimm Gnangnon
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Development Aid ◽  
Aid For Trade ◽  
Trade Sector

scholarly journals Aid for Trade and Real Exchange Rate in Recipient-Countries

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
SENA KIMM GNANGNON
Keyword(s):  
International Trade ◽  
Exchange Rate ◽  
Real Exchange Rate ◽  
Scaling Up ◽  
Development Aid ◽  
Current Analysis ◽  
Policy Perspective ◽  
Aid For Trade ◽  
Trade Sector ◽  
Trade Market

Abstract The current analysis contributes to the literature on the real exchange rate (RER) effect of development aid by separating out the RER effect of the development aid allocated to the trade sector - referred to as Aid for Trade (AfT) - from the effect of NonAfT flows. The empirical findings show that AfT flows exert a RER depreciation in recipient-economies, while NonAfT flows are associated with a RER appreciation. From a policy perspective, these results show that scaling-up AfT flows could promote countries' competitiveness in the international trade market through a greater extent of RER depreciation.

scholarly journals Development Aid and Export Resilience in Developing Countries: A Reference to Aid for Trade

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sena Kimm Gnangnon
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
Development Aid ◽  
Least Developed Countries ◽  
Member States ◽  
Health Crisis ◽  
Aid For Trade ◽  
The 2008 Financial Crisis ◽  
Positive Effect

The COVID-19 pandemic, like previous major crises, such as the 2008 financial crisis, has had a severe negative impact on international trade flows. International institutions are now exploring ways to help their member states recover from the health crisis, and foster the resilience of their economies to future crises. As far as trade is concerned, institutions that deal primarily with trade matters are making effort to help their member states foster the resilience of their trade performance to future shocks. In this context, the World Trade Organization (WTO), which is the only international organization that deals with the global rules of trade between nations, has organized a series of events since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. It has now planned to hold in September 2021 the 2021 WTO Public Forum whose theme is "Trade Beyond COVID-19: Building Resilience". The present paper aims to contribute to this debate by examining the effect of development aid, i.e., the so-called official development aid, in particular its Aid for Trade (AfT) component, on export resilience. The resilience of exports refers to the capacity of countries' aggregate exports to resist to shocks, whether environmental or external shocks. The core argument of the analysis is that development aid would affect export resilience through its effect on productive capacities. The analysis covers 93 developing countries over the period 2002-2018. The findings indicate that total development aid flows, including both AfT flows and NonAfT flows exert a positive effect on export resilience. Among AfT components, AfT for productive capacities appears to exert a higher positive effect on export resilience than AfT for economic infrastructure and AfT for trade policy and regulation. In addition, development aid (whatever the aid variable considered) exerts the highest positive effect on export resilience in countries (such as Least developed countries - LDCs) that have the lowest level of productive capacities. These findings highlight the need for donor-countries to supply higher development aid flows, in particular AfT flows to countries such as LDCs that have low levels of productive capacities.

scholarly journals Effect of Productive Capacities on Economic Complexity: Do Aid for Trade Flows Matter?

2021 ◽  
Vol 36 (4) ◽  
pp. 626-688
Author(s):  
Sèna Kimm Gnangnon
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Method Of Moments ◽  
Generalized Method Of Moments ◽  
Scaling Up ◽  
Development Aid ◽  
Trade Flows ◽  
Poor Countries ◽  
Economic Complexity ◽  
Aid For Trade

This is the first study to examine the effect of productive capacities on economic complexity and understand whether the Aid for Trade (AfT) flows is important for this effect in recipient countries. The analysis uses a sample of 126 developed and developing countries for 2002-2018 and adopts the two-step system Generalized Method of Moments approach. Results show that strengthening productive capacities enhances economic complexity. Furthermore, productive capacities and total AfT flows are strongly complementary in positively affecting economic complexity, and the degree of complementarity is higher for poor countries than for other AfT-recipient countries. Similarly, productive capacities are strongly complementary with total Non-AfT flows, as well as for total development aid. These findings highlight the need for scaling-up development aid flows, notably AfT flows, in favor of developing countries and poor countries having the lowest levels of productive capacities.

scholarly journals Creating Destinations for a Better Tomorrow: UN Development Aid for Cultural Tourism in the 1960s

2021 ◽  
pp. 002200942097476
Author(s):  
Marie Huber
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Development Aid ◽  
Employment Sector ◽  
Development Decade ◽  
Colonial Legacies ◽  
The Subject ◽  
1960S And 1970S ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
International Experts

Tourism is today considered as a crucial employment sector in many developing countries. In the growing field of historical tourism research, however, the relationships between tourism and development, and the role of international organizations, above all the UN, have been given little attention to date. My paper will illuminate how during the 1960s tourism first became the subject of UN policies and a praised solution for developing countries. Examples from expert consultancy missions in developing countries such as Ethiopia, India and Nepal will be contextualized within the more general debates and programme activities for heritage conservation and also the first UN development decade. Drawing on sources from the archives of UNESCO, as well as tourism promotion material, it will be possible to understand how tourism sectors in many so-called developing countries were shaped considerably by this international cooperation. Like in other areas of development aid, activities in tourism were grounded in scientific studies and based on statistical data and analysis by international experts. Examining this knowledge production is a telling exercise in understanding development histories colonial legacies under the umbrella of the UN during the 1960s and 1970s.

scholarly journals Analysing inter-relationships among water, governance, human development variables in developing countries

2012 ◽  
Vol 16 (10) ◽  
pp. 3791-3816 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. Dondeynaz ◽  
C. Carmona Moreno ◽  
J. J. Céspedes Lorente
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Water Resources ◽  
Water Supply ◽  
Human Development ◽  
Environmental Concern ◽  
Water Governance ◽  
Development Aid ◽  
Research Centre ◽  
Joint Research ◽  
Discussion Section

Abstract. The "Integrated Water Resources Management" principle was formally laid down at the International Conference on Water and Sustainable development in Dublin 1992. One of the main results of this conference is that improving Water and Sanitation Services (WSS), being a complex and interdisciplinary issue, passes through collaboration and coordination of different sectors (environment, health, economic activities, governance, and international cooperation). These sectors influence or are influenced by the access to WSS. The understanding of these interrelations appears as crucial for decision makers in the water sector. In this framework, the Joint Research Centre (JRC) of the European Commission (EC) has developed a new database (WatSan4Dev database) containing 42 indicators (called variables in this paper) from environmental, socio-economic, governance and financial aid flows data in developing countries. This paper describes the development of the WatSan4Dev dataset, the statistical processes needed to improve the data quality, and finally, the analysis to verify the database coherence is presented. Based on 25 relevant variables, the relationships between variables are described and organised into five factors (HDP – Human Development against Poverty, AP – Human Activity Pressure on water resources, WR – Water Resources, ODA – Official Development Aid, CEC – Country Environmental Concern). Linear regression methods are used to identify key variables having influence on water supply and sanitation. First analysis indicates that the informal urbanisation development is an important factor negatively influencing the percentage of the population having access to WSS. Health, and in particular children's health, benefits from the improvement of WSS. Irrigation is also enhancing Water Supply service thanks to multi-purpose infrastructure. Five country profiles are also created to deeper understand and synthetize the amount of information gathered. This new classification of countries is useful in identifying countries with a less advanced position and weaknesses to be tackled. The relevance of indicators gathered to represent environmental and water resources state is questioned in the discussion section. The paper concludes with the necessity to increase the reliability of current indicators and calls for further research on specific indicators, in particular on water quality at national scale, in order to better include environmental state in analysis to WSS.

scholarly journals Development Aid, Economic Growth Volatility and Poverty Volatility in Developing Countries

2021 ◽  
Vol Volume II (December 2021) ◽  
pp. 1-15
Author(s):  
Sèna Kimm GNANGNON
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
Developing Countries ◽  
Development Aid ◽  
Negative Effect ◽  
Growth Volatility

This article has analysed the effect of development aid flows on poverty volatility in developing countries, including through the economic growth volatility channel. Using a sample of 106 countries over the period 1980-2017, and the two-step system Generalized Methods of Moment (GMM) technique, the analysis has shown that development aid flows dampen the positive poverty volatility effect of economic growth volatility: the magnitude of the negative effect of development aid on poverty volatility rises as the degree of economic growth volatility increases. Additionally, development aid exerts a higher negative effect on poverty volatility as countries face higher poverty rates. These findings highlight the importance of development aid for stabilizing poverty rates.

scholarly journals Global Non-Profit Chains and the Challenges of Development Aid Contracting

2018 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ronelle Burger ◽  
Trudy Owens ◽  
Aseem Prakash
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Case Studies ◽  
Transaction Cost ◽  
Conceptual Analysis ◽  
Primary Objective ◽  
Development Aid ◽  
Asset Specificity ◽  
Information Asymmetries ◽  
Non Profit ◽  
Enforcement Mechanisms

AbstractThis paper employs Oliver Williamson’s transaction cost approach to assess contracting. We find that donor contracting with global non-profit chains is conducive to NPO opportunism due to the asset specificity of the contracts, infrequent contracting, and the uncertainty of outcomes. These risks are further exacerbated by the weak enforcement mechanisms available in many developing countries. Williamson’s framework predicts that these risks would tempt donors to resort to the muscular approach, where they would exercise maximum control over the non-profit chain. Although competition would be a safeguard against the muscular approach, the donor landscape suffers from collusion and is monopsonistic. Our analysis suggests that while the current contracting and oversight arrangements might serve the donor procedural objective to exercise control in a sector marked by information asymmetries, these arrangements can undermine the primary objective of donors, namely responsiveness to beneficiaries, and ultimately, improved beneficiary welfare. We illustrate our conceptual analysis with short case studies of three Ugandan NPOs.

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