Public Investment in Resource-Abundant Developing Countries

The mHealth field understandably arose from a base of practice, developed a nascent, yet ever-expanding, body of inter-disciplinary scholarship, and currently hopes for recognition by, and establishment on, national and trans-national policy bodies and agendas respectively. However, to justify public investment, policymakers require a body of theoretically sound, methodologically rigorous, and generalizable, evidence on how mobile technologies can effectively improve basic healthcare service delivery for hard-to-reach, resource-poor populations in developing countries. This essay draws upon prior work, ranging from a review article, an mHealth intervention for Indonesian healthcare workers within the medical infrastructure, to a text-messaging project in Uganda focused on beneficiaries. The argument is organized around theoretical, methodological, and sustainability issues, and proposes suggestions for how the discipline of mobile communication studies can add value to the field of mHealth research in developing countries.

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Public infrastructure investment and fiscal sustainability in Latin America: incompatible goals?

Journal of Economic Studies ◽

10.1108/jes-03-2012-0036 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 41 (1) ◽

pp. 29-50 ◽

Cited By ~ 6

Author(s):

Luis Carranza ◽

Christian Daude ◽

Angel Melguizo

Keyword(s):

Developing Countries ◽

Latin America ◽

Latin American ◽

Public Investment ◽

Fiscal Rules ◽

Infrastructure Investment ◽

Fiscal Consolidation ◽

Public Infrastructure ◽

Content Type ◽

Fiscal Space

Purpose – This paper aims to understand the relationship in developing countries between fiscal consolidation and public investment – a flexible part of the budget that is easier to cut during consolidation effort, but with potentially negative growth effects. Analyzing in detail the case of Peru, the paper explores alternative fiscal rules and frameworks that might help create fiscal space for infrastructure investment. Design/methodology/approach – The paper analyses trends in public and total infrastructure investment in six large Latin American economies, in the light of fiscal developments since the early 1980s. In particular, the paper explores the association between fiscal consolidations (improvements in the structural fiscal balance) and public infrastructure investment rates. In the second part, the paper analyzes recent changes in the fiscal framework of Peru and shows how they were conductive in creating additional fiscal space. Findings – The authors argue that post-crisis fiscal frameworks, notably fiscal rules that are increasingly popular in the region, should not only consolidate the recent progress towards debt sustainability, but also create the fiscal space to close these infrastructure gaps. These points are illustrated in a detailed account of recent developments in the fiscal framework and public investment in the Peruvian case. Originality/value – The paper contributes new evidence to the literature on fiscal consolidation and the composition of government expenditures. While the literature based on evidence from the 1990s has argued that fiscal consolidation plans in Latin America have almost always led to a significant reduction in public infrastructure investment, the paper finds less clear cut evidence when extending the analysis backwards (1980s) and forwards (2000s). The example of the case of Peru is used to explore fiscal institutions and rules that might be useful for other developing countries that face important infrastructure gaps.

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PUBLIC INVESTMENT AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR TECHNOLOGICAL PROGRESS: A COMPARISON BETWEEN DEVELOPED AND EMERGING ECONOMIES

Semioses Inovação Desenvolvimento e Sustentabilidade ◽

10.15202/1981996x.2019v13n4p1 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 13 (4) ◽

pp. 1-14

Author(s):

Presley Vasconcellos ◽

Fabiola De Sampaio Rodrigues Grazinoli Garrido

Keyword(s):

Developing Countries ◽

Emerging Economies ◽

Technological Progress ◽

Socioeconomic Development ◽

Public Investment ◽

Public Spending ◽

Scientific Progress ◽

International Market ◽

Development Policies ◽

Effective Development

Emerging economies have unique characteristics. Governments should promote effective development policies taking into account the particularities of each country. Public spending in the educational system for stimulating technological and scientific progress should be part of the government’s agenda on socioeconomic development, creating successful strategies to stimulate robust and innovative processes directed to meet internal demands. The investment in research and development by developing countries such as China has improved their economy and it allows them to become leaders in different sectors of the international market.

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Chapter 43 Human and physical infrastructure: Public investment and pricing policies in developing countries

Handbook of Development Economics ◽

10.1016/s1573-4471(95)30020-1 ◽

1995 ◽

pp. 2773-2843 ◽

Cited By ~ 19

Author(s):

Emmanuel Jimenez

Keyword(s):

Developing Countries ◽

Public Investment ◽

Pricing Policies ◽

Physical Infrastructure

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Public Investment in Resource-Abundant Developing Countries

SSRN Electronic Journal ◽

10.2139/ssrn.2192363 ◽

2012 ◽

Author(s):

Andrew Berg ◽

Rafael Portillo ◽

Shu-Chun Susan Yang ◽

Luis-Felipe Zanna

Keyword(s):

Developing Countries ◽

Public Investment

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Revenue Sharing Arrangements: Options and Relative Merits (The Mahbub ul Haq Memorial Lecture)

The Pakistan Development Review ◽

10.30541/v49i4ipp.311-332 ◽

2010 ◽

Vol 49 (4I) ◽

pp. 311-332 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Vito Tanzi

Keyword(s):

Developing Countries ◽

Social Services ◽

Public Investment ◽

Memorial Lecture ◽

Tax Revenue ◽

World War ◽

John Maynard Keynes ◽

Government Role ◽

The Rich ◽

First Time

The decades immediately after World War Two saw: (a) the spreading of ideas, rightly or wrongly attributed to John Maynard Keynes, that called for a larger government role in the economy; (b) the growing popularity of socialism; and (c) the creation of the United Nations, an event that gave a global voice to the citizens of lowincome countries and that provided statistics that, for the first time pointed to the big differences in living standards that existed between the so-called “developed” or “advanced” countries and the “underdeveloped”, or “developing” countries, and between the rich and the poor within specific countries. Those decades witnessed a period of fast growth in the activities of governments and especially in those of the central governments. The central governments of many countries assumed increasingly important and wider roles and functions. See Tanzi (2011) forthcoming, and Tanzi (2008). The governments of many countries tried to raise their tax revenue to be able to increase public investment, to create needed infrastructure and to provide better social services, such as education, health, and social assistance, to their citizens. In those decades the importance and the revenue needs of national or central governments grew and the literature on “taxable capacity” became a popular branch of economics. Especially developing countries needed more government revenues and more taxes to be able to grow.

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Is the Private Sector more Productive than the Public Sector?

The Pakistan Development Review ◽

10.30541/v30i4iipp.721-729 ◽

1991 ◽

Vol 30 (4II) ◽

pp. 721-729

Author(s):

Khwaja Sarmad

Keyword(s):

Developing Countries ◽

Public Sector ◽

Private Sector ◽

Public Investment ◽

Empirical Work ◽

Empirical Support ◽

Private Investment ◽

Total Production ◽

The Public ◽

The Government

In developing countries the rapid growth of the public sector during the past few decades was viewed as an important means for accelerating the pace of economic growth. In most developing countries the public sector now accounts for a prominent share of total production and investment. But the contribution of the public sector to growth has been much below expectations. In many cases public enterprises require large subsidies from the government and impose a significant fiscal burden on the economy, which leads to the notion that the private sector is much more productive than the public sector. However, little empirical work has been done in this field so that the proposals that emphasize the private sector vis-a-vis the public sector rest largely on theoretical considerations. Recent work by Khan and Reinhart (1990) is an important exception. Using cross-section data for the seventies of 24 developing countries they show that the arguments favouring the private sector in adjustment programmes have empirical support. Khan and Reinhart estimate a growth model in which the effect of private and public investment on growth is separated. A comparison of the marginal productivities of the two types of investment allows them to conclude that "all in all, there does seem to be some merit in the key role assigned to private investment in the development process by supporters of market -based strategies". [Khan and Reinhart (1990), p. 25.]

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