scholarly journals Economic and Monetary Integration in ECOWAS Countries: A Panel VAR Approach to Identify Macroeconomic Shocks

2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 61-87
Author(s):  
Asta Ndongo ◽  
Ibrahima Thione Diop

This paper studies the impact of output, exchange rate, price, and economic policies (fiscal and monetary) shocks to Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) economies over the period 1977-2019. The results of the impulse response functions obtained from the panel VAR show that monetary policy shocks stimulate economic activity, whereas fiscal shocks lead to a contraction. Moreover, these economic policy shocks lead to an increase in the price level. Finally, they have opposite effects on the real exchange rate: a monetary policy shock leads to an appreciation of national currencies against the US dollar, while a fiscal innovation leads to a depreciation of these currencies. As for exchange rate and price shocks, they create inflation and consequently a decline in economic activity. Furthermore, the forecast error variance decomposition reveals that real exchange rate shocks contribute the most to future fluctuations in macroeconomic variables in ECOWAS countries. Moreover, a comparison of the impact on the two currency areas, West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU) and West African Monetary Zone (WAMZ), shows the degree of asymmetry between the two areas. The analysis shows, on the one hand, that shocks are more persistent and significant in the WAMZ and, on the other hand, that except for real exchange rate shocks, the two zones respond asymmetrically to shocks emanating from the other variables.

2019 ◽  
Vol 57 (3) ◽  
pp. 329-350
Author(s):  
Vlado Vujanić ◽  
Dragan Gligorić ◽  
Nikola Žarković

AbstractThe economic authorities of each country seek to maintain the expansion phase through the implementation of various economic policy measures, namely, to prevent or mitigate the recessionary phase in economic development. In that context, it is of considerable importance to understand how monetary policy decisions affect the movement of macroeconomic variables. The paper aims to examine and evaluate the contribution of monetary policy to mitigating the effects of the global economic and financial crisis, using the Autoregressive Distributed Lag model, by analysing the impact of the real exchange rate, reference interest rate and money supply on the level of economic activity in Poland. Econometric analysis encompasses the period from 2006 to 2017. The research results suggest that there is a significant relationship between real economic activity and the real exchange rate both in the short and long term, but not between the reference interest rate and the money supply.


2017 ◽  
Vol 62 (2) ◽  
pp. 20-41
Author(s):  
Chama Chipeta ◽  
Daniel Francois Meyer ◽  
Paul-Francois Muzindutsi

Abstract Job creation is at the centre of economic development and remains a source of sustenance for social and human relations. The creation of a job-enabling economic environment is imperative in promoting social and economic cohesiveness in the macro and microeconomic environment. Any shocks to the economy, particularly those of exchange rate shocks and changes in economic growth, may negatively affect the labour market and job creation. This study made use of quarterly observations, from the first quarter of 1995 to the fourth quarter of 2015, to investigate the effect of the real exchange rate and economic growth on South Africa’s employment status. South Africa, a developing country, was selected as a case study due to its high unemployment rate that is still increasing. The Vector Autoregressive (VAR) model and multivariate co-integration techniques were used in assessing the impact and responsiveness of employment to the real exchange rate and real economic growth in South Africa. Findings of this study revealed that employment responds positively to economic growth and negatively to the real exchange rate in the long-run. The short-run displays a positive relationship between real economic growth and employment, while the relationship between employment and the real exchange rate is also negative. However, the effect of economic growth in creating jobs is not significant enough in stimulating job creation in South Africa, as indicated by results in variance decomposition. Movements in the exchange rate exerted a significant short and long-run negative effect on employment dynamics; implying that a depreciation of the rand against the U.S. dollar is associated with decrease in overall employment. Exchange rate stability is thus important for economic growth and job creation in South Africa. The study provided further recommendations on promoting job creation in South Africa and other developing countries.


2017 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 32
Author(s):  
Hisao Kumamoto ◽  
Masao Kumamoto

In this study, we empirically investigate how currency substitution transmits foreign monetary policy shocks to domestic countries and evaluate how the central bank respond to real exchange rate movements in three inflation-targeting Latin American countries under currency substitution, namely Chile, Mexico and Peru, between 2000 and 2011. Our model is based on a small open economy dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model that incorporates currency substitution and incomplete financial markets, and we estimate it by using Bayesian estimation techniques. Our empirical results are as follows. First, the degree of currency substitution is higher in Mexico, while it is negligible in Chile and Peru, which reflects the slight differences in the parameter values capturing the preference for the domestic currency among these countries. Second, the estimated coefficients of the real exchange rate gap in the monetary policy rule are high, meaning that the central banks in these countries actively respond to real exchange rate movements to diminish real exchange rate volatility. Third, domestic monetary policy influences the domestic economy through the real interest rate channel. On the contrary, foreign monetary policy has a significant effect in Mexico, while it is insignificant in Chile and Peru. This finding suggests the potential instability of currency substitution in that slight changes in the parameter values capturing the preference for the domestic currency alter the degree of insulation from foreign monetary policy shocks.


Ekonomika ◽  
2004 ◽  
Vol 68 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philippe Grainville

The implementation of the EMU translates a new European policy mix. Our article proposes a study on the coordination of the monetary and budgetary policies for the Baltic States for their complete integration in the European policy mix. New members must ensure a monetary policy able to answer the objective of price stability; they take part in EMS II for three years.The budgetary sovereignty of governments is relative taking into account their obligations in accordance with the Pact of Stability and Growth. After the participation in the Monetary Union. the countries cannot change their exchange rate, they will loose weapon of the exchange rate and will have henceforth only the budgetary and fiscal policies to adjust their economies. These last are in addition limited by the criteria of convergence and the Pact of Stability and Growth.Credibility can be obtained only by affecting to each authority a specific objective, namely the price stability for the monetary authority and the soutenability of the national debt for the budgetary authority.A not balanced policy mix encourages financial turbulences, which occur when the investors have doubts as to the capacity of the country to absorb a shock (for example, in Russia). Budgetary deficit can reach a significant level. The monetary supply which can finance the deficit is then higher than the demand.According to monetarists, the budgetary discipline is associated with a partial control of prices and wages. In Poland, the “popiwek”, which is a tax on the increases in wages, attempts to reduce the budgetary deficit. Such a policy of freezed prices and wages is able to produce a fast deceleration of inflation. The public accounts thus tend to improve quickly.For monetarists, the monetary policy does not have any influence on the real sphere. The entry in the EMU supposes the loss of the exchange rate. The adjustment of the economic policy for the Member States in the event of asymmetrical shocks can be done only by the tax and budgetary policies. The latter are indirectly forced by the respect of the criteria of restoration of public finances; in the Central European East countries these problems are significant.In the current context of slowdown in economic activity, several governments of the Euro zone asked the European Central Bank to lower their rates to support the economic activity. Within this framework, we will study the impact on the growth of this new policy mix to which the Baltic States and Poland will be subjected.


2017 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 579-594
Author(s):  
Abdul Rahman Nizamani ◽  
Zulkefly Abdul Karim ◽  
Mohd Azlan Shah Zaidi ◽  
Norlin Khalid

This paper examines the effects of monetary policy and exchange rate shocks on the trade balance of Pakistan. Theseeffects are further investigated on the two broad categories of trade surplus and trade deficit sectors.Thisstudy has employed the Structural Vector Error Correction Model (SVECM) withalongrun and short run restrictions to identify the monetary policy shocks. The results from the SVECM are consistent with the standard theoretical expectationsi.e. free from empirical puzzles.The findings have revealed that the tradebalance deteriorates to the contractionary monetary policy shocks, providing support to the expenditure switching effects of monetary policy in Pakistan. Furthermore, the effectiveness of monetarypolicyis only limited to trade surplus sectors.On the other hand, the exchange rateshocks do not support the J-Curve effects on both the aggregate as well as disaggregate level trade balance.


2019 ◽  
Vol 54 (4) ◽  
pp. 375-398
Author(s):  
Moses K. Tule ◽  
Taiwo Ajilore ◽  
Augustine Ujunwa

The study utilized quarterly time series data for Nigeria and three selected West African Monetary Zone (WAMZ) countries for the period 1980–2016 to verify whether monetary policy shocks emanating from Nigeria are an important source of macroeconomic fluctuations in WAMZ economies. The study complemented the Global vector autoregressive method with the Diebold–Yilmaz (2009) connectedness weights computation for the analysis. Inferences from generalized impulse response function (GIRF) analysis indicated that an unanticipated Nigerian monetary policy shock depreciates the Nigeria–USA exchange rate, stimulates growth, decelerates inflation and expands the money stock in the short run for Nigeria. In Ghana, Nigeria’s monetary policy shocks similarly depreciates the exchange rate, slows growth with high inflationary impact in the short run. In the Gambia, unanticipated shocks emanating from Nigeria strengthens the Gambia–USA exchange rate, depresses growth and inflationary pressures. Sierra Leone shares the appreciation of its currency with the Gambia, in addition to an economic expansion and rising inflation. Money supply also increases to accommodate the expanding demand. These results validated the thesis that there exist considerable geographical linkages within the WAMZ regions through which macroeconomic fluctuations are transmitted. For policy, monetary authorities in the region should collectively address the question of how to stabilize the economy in response to monetary policy shocks emanating from Nigeria. JEL Codes: E52, E32, E65, F02


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