Debt Relief, Additionality, and Aid Allocation in Low Income Countries

Debt Relief, Additionality, and Aid Allocation in Low Income Countries
Author: Mr.Robert Powell
Publisher: International Monetary Fund
Total Pages: 22
Release: 2003-09-01
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1451858779

This paper models the resource implications of debt relief provided to low-income countries (LICs). Obtaining debt relief does not necessarily lead to individual aid-dependent countries receiving more overall resources from the donor community. Preliminary cross-section estimates suggest that debt relief provided to low-income countries in the period 1996 2000 neither crowded out other non-debt relief-related aid flows to the debtors concerned nor created significant extra net resources for those countries. While it is too early to fully assess the resource implications of the enhanced HIPC Initiative, this paper provides a possible approach to such an evaluation.

Delivering on Debt Relief

Delivering on Debt Relief
Author: Nancy Birdsall
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Total Pages: 179
Release: 2002-04-17
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0881324450

This study brings readers up to date on the complicated and controversial subject of debt relief for the poorest countries of the world. What has actually been achieved? Has debt relief provided truly additional resources to fight poverty? How will the design and timing of the "enhanced Heavily Indebted Poor Country (HIPC) initiative" affect the development prospects of the world's poorest countries and their people? The study then moves on to address several broader policy questions: Is debt relief a step toward more efficient and equitable government spending, building better institutions, and attracting productive private investment in the poorest countries? Who pays for debt relief? Is there a case for further relief? Most important, how can the case for debt relief be sustained in a broader effort to combat poverty in the poorest countries?

The Dynamic Implications of Debt Relief for Low-Income Countries

The Dynamic Implications of Debt Relief for Low-Income Countries
Author: Mr.Ales Bulir
Publisher: International Monetary Fund
Total Pages: 27
Release: 2011-07-01
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1455293717

The effects of debt relief on incentives to accumulate debt, consume, and invest are an important concern for donors and recipients. Using a dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model of a small open economy with a minimum consumption requirement and an endogenous relief probability, we show that excessive debt accumulation is consistent with an anticipation of a future debt relief. Simulations of the calibrated model using 1982-2006 Ugandan data suggest that debt-relief episodes are likely to have only a temporary impact on the level of debt in low-income countries, while being associated with more consumption and less invesment. The long-run debt-to-GDP ratio is estimated to be about twice as high with debt relief than without it.

Further Debt Relief for Low-Income Countries - Key Issues and Preliminary Considerations

Further Debt Relief for Low-Income Countries - Key Issues and Preliminary Considerations
Author: International Monetary Fund. Policy Development and Review Dept.
Publisher: International Monetary Fund
Total Pages: 24
Release: 2005-10-03
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1498331718

The International Monetary and Finance Committee at its 2004 Annual Meetings called on the international community to provide assistance including “further debt relief” to low-income countries for achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). It reaffirmed the Fund’s “important role” in supporting lowincome countries and called on the Fund to consider “further debt relief and its financing.” More impetus for this request was provided by various recent proposals (summarized in Annex I). At their meeting in London in February, G7 Finance Ministers expressed their willingness to provide as much as 100 percent multilateral debt relief.

Assessing Aid

Assessing Aid
Author:
Publisher: World Bank Publications
Total Pages: 164
Release: 1998
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 9780195211238

Assessing Aid determines that the effectiveness of aid is not decided by the amount received but rather the institutional and policy environment into which it is accepted. It examines how development assistance can be more effective at reducing global poverty and gives five mainrecommendations for making aid more effective: targeting financial aid to poor countries with good policies and strong economic management; providing policy-based aid to demonstrated reformers; using simpler instruments to transfer resources to countries with sound management; focusing projects oncreating and transmitting knowledge and capacity; and rethinking the internal incentives of aid agencies.

Debt Swaps for Sustainable Development

Debt Swaps for Sustainable Development
Author: Dr. Jürgen Kaiser
Publisher: Iucn
Total Pages: 76
Release: 1996
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN:

This publication is aimed at helping IUCN's members to understand the scope and mechanisms of debt conversion and to spot opportunities for their own action in this important field.

IMF Macroeconomic Research on Low-Income Countries

IMF Macroeconomic Research on Low-Income Countries
Author: International Monetary Fund
Publisher: International Monetary Fund
Total Pages: 130
Release: 2004-01-30
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9781589062733

Summarizes the for ward-looking analytical work program on macroeconomic issues related to the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper approach. The program is evolving through a process that began with a technical workshop; participants from low-income countries, donors, academia, and civil society drafted guidance on selected issues and identified priority research topics. Partners, policymakers, and economic scholars are encouraged to share their perspectives and findings through respective team leaders, whose e-mail addresses are provided. The publication also summarizes IMF analytical work, and contains a bibliography of nearly 1,000 papers.

New Sources of Development Finance

New Sources of Development Finance
Author: A. B. Atkinson
Publisher: OUP Oxford
Total Pages: 268
Release: 2004-11-04
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0191535273

This is an open access publication, available online and distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-Share Alike 3.0 IGO licence (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 IGO). It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations. As their Millennium Development Goals, world leaders have pledged by 2015 to halve the number of people living in extreme poverty and hunger, to achieve universal primary education, to reduce child mortality, to halt the spread of HIV/AIDS, and to halve the number of people without safe drinking water. Achieving these goals requires a large increase in the flow of financial resources to developing countries - double the present development assistance from abroad. Examining innovative ways to secure these resources, this book sets out a framework for the economic analysis of different sources of funding, applying the tools of modern public economics to identify the key issues. It examines the role of new sources of overseas aid, considers the fiscal architecture and the lessons that can be learned from federal fiscal systems, asks how far increased transfers impose a burden on donors, and investigates how far one can separate raising resources from their use. In turn, the book examines global environmental taxes (such as a carbon tax) the taxation of currency transactions (the Tobin tax), a development-focused allocation of Special Drawing Rights by the IMF, the UK Government proposal for an International Finance Facility, increased private donations for development purposes, a global lottery (or premium bond), and increased remittances by emigrants. In each case, it considers the feasibility of the proposal and the resources that it can realistically raise. In each case, it offers new perspectives and insights into these new and controversial proposals.