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WHAT EXACTLY is a poverty reduction strategy paper (PRSP), the centerpiece of the international community's new assault on poverty? It is essentially a road map prepared by countries themselves to [...]

This article is based on a paper presented at a conference on food security and trade in May 1991. The work on food security in Malaui, Mozambique, Tanzania, Zambia, and [...]

THE images of emaciated children with eyes so hollow they seem to be looking death squarely in the face have faded from our morning papers and evening news programs. Yet, [...]

African Development Making Sense of the Issues and Actors Lynne Rienner Publishers, Inc., Boulder, Colorado, 2007, 250 pp., $22 (paper). Sub-Saharan Africa's early post-independence years were hopeful, and an international [...]

National and local governments own a potential gold mine of assets, mostly in the form of real estate and government-owned companies. With better governance, many of these assets--such as outdated [...]

We never know the worth of water till the well is dry. --Thomas Fuller THE largest reservoir system serving Sao Paulo, Brazil, is nearing depletion. A combination of population growth, [...]

IT was a heist the Pink Panther would have been proud of: over several months, a gang of thieves surreptitiously siphoned off hundreds of thousands of gallons of maple syrup [...]

APREGNANT South African mother diagnosed with HIV is scared and has no idea what to do. She is reassured when introduced to a 'mentor mother' from the nonprofit mothers2mothers who [...]

HEALTH care reform is tricky. Access to affordable health care is of paramount importance, but paying for it can put enormous pressure on government budgets. Fortunately, a number of reform [...]

The shock waves from the collapse of investment banking group Lehman Brothers were still reverberating around the world when, in early 2009, the U.S. authorities invited the International Monetary Fund [...]

ECONOMIC policymaking is testing enough in today's globalized world for those who are duly elected or appointed, and are supported by the accoutrements of office. But Maria Ramos started drafting [...]

SOVEREIGN wealth funds, essentially state-owned investment entities with long time horizons, are among the investors best equipped to navigate financial markets after the global crisis. Yet they too face potential [...]

As the world economy ponders the lessons from the receding global crisis, a fierce debate has erupted about central banking concepts thought to have been long settled (Goodfriend, 2007). The [...]

A NIGHT in jail first underscored to Daron Acemoglu the importance of regulation in the market system. The teenaged Acemoglu had been one of several unlicensed learner drivers careening around [...]

THE 'Power 50'--that was what Institutional Investor called its 2009 list of the 50 most influential people in the financial world. Many of the names were those of top policymakers [...]

THE financial crisis has exposed weaknesses in the current regulatory and supervisory frameworks. The recent developments have made it clear that action is needed in at least four areas to [...]

CRISIS anniversaries are usually occasions to draw lessons from the past--and the 10th anniversary of the Asian financial crisis last year was no different. Numerous conferences analyzed events of a [...]

THE causes of the crisis in subprime mortgages have become clear. They started with poor underwriting practices, which became legion. But damage was propagated at each stage of the complicated [...]

JACQUES POLAK--a major 20th-century economist whose pioneering research molded the basic economic approach of the IMF--nearly spent his life as an accountant. When he enrolled at the University of Amsterdam [...]

THE current crisis is the worst to hit mature financial markets in decades, and it is not yet over. In the run-up to the crisis, low nominal interest rates, ample [...]

HEALTH problems have never respected borders. Leprosy spread from Asia to Europe in the 4th century B.C., thanks most likely to the army of Alexander the Great. The Black Death [...]

HOW could a modest increase in seriously delinquent subprime mortgages, which amounted to an additional $34 billion in troubled loans, so disrupt the $57 trillion U.S. financial system last summer [...]

MOST scholarly articles fall without making a sound in the academic forest. Not ones by Robert Barro. A recent list of the 146 most influential articles in economics since 1970 [...]

WITH the economic crises of the 1990s, economists were reminded that they could no longer rely solely on a country's so-called flow variables (among them revenues, expenditures, imports, exports, and [...]

MANY PEOPLE can take credit for the idea of a single currency in Europe, but one man in particular was responsible for making it a reality. Otmar Issing, the first [...]

THE HOPE of better risk sharing, more efficient allocation of capital, more productive investment, and, ultimately, higher standards of living for all is propelling the drive for stronger connections between [...]

AFTER decades of economic stagnation, growth in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) has picked up considerably, reaching an eight-year high of 5.6 percent in 2004. Only a slight dip in this rate [...]

IN HIS FIRST year at the helm of the Asian Development Bank (ADB), Haruhiko Kuroda has had a roller-coaster ride, trying to help the region grapple with the risks of [...]

ETHIOPIA, among the poorest countries in Africa, presents one of the biggest development challenges in a region beset by frequent drought and food shortages and hobbled by inadequate roads and [...]

THE INTERNATIONAL community is currently seeking to scale up official development assistance, provide further debt relief, and explore several innovative mechanisms for development financing to help low-income countries achieve the [...]

THE GOAL of a common African currency has long been a pillar of African unity, a symbol of the strength that its backers hope will emerge from efforts to integrate [...]

THE financial crises of the 1990s underscored the importance of detailed knowledge about the vulnerabilities of the financial sector. In response, the IMF, working closely with the international community, began [...]

THE FIRST WAVE of transition countries to join the European Union (EU) are turning their attention to the next step in their integration with Europe--replacing their national currencies with the [...]

OFFICIAL intervention in the foreign exchange market is a risky business, particularly for developing countries with low central bank credibility and a weak external liquidity position. Intervention can often be [...]

AS THE incidence and intensity of natural disasters have increased, the resulting economic losses have soared. During the past 10 years for which comprehensive data are available (1992-2001), losses stemming [...]

THE ECONOMIC record of mineral-exporting countries has generally been disappointing. Oil exporters, in particular, have done far less well than resource-poor countries over the past few decades, especially when one [...]

THE IMF'S original mandate was to provide assistance to member countries in short-term crisis situations, but, in practice, a number of countries have depended on IMF support for long periods. [...]

For the international community, one of the biggest challenges is how to reconcile the need for more country ownership of adjustment and reform programs with the need for conditions on [...]

WHEN THE IMF launched the Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility (PRGF) in 1999, it envisaged some far-reaching changes in its operations. First, there would be a change in the content [...]

To spur growth and reduce poverty, poor countries will need efficient formal and informal institutions that support market activity. A major World Bank study offers insights into how such institutions [...]

AIDS is not just a health issue but a development problem that must be addressed at the global level. As countries increasingly recognize the need to incorporate strategies for tackling [...]

In the wake of the Kosovo crisis, the countries of Southeastern Europe have made great strides, although they still have to catch up with their neighbors in Central and Eastern [...]

SINCE the mid- 1990s, financial crises have erupted in half a dozen developing and emerging market countries in Asia and Latin America as well as in Russia. The costs for [...]

The relationship between corporate balance sheets and a country's macroeconomy is receiving increased attention from policymakers in many countries, especially those most affected by the Asian crisis. How can policymakers [...]

Large capital inflows can bring considerable economic benefits to developing countries but, if not properly managed, can also cause economies to overheat, increase exchange rate volatility, and lead eventually to [...]

Finding ways to 'bail in' the private sector is an important element of crisis prevention and resolution. Yet no mechanisms are universally applicable, and some proposed strategies could precipitate the [...]

Recent financial crises have led to renewed interest in having an international lender of last resort. Would this make sense and, if so, would it be appropriate for the IMF [...]

In recent years, many developing and transition countries have become more closely integrated into the global financial system. But to benefit fully from their growing access to international financing, they [...]

A deposit insurance system can contribute to financial stability, but only if it is adequately funded and if other safeguards - such as a strong bank supervision program - are [...]

A country that is liberalizing its capital account faces the challenges of strengthening financial institutions to ensure they are capable of operating in a more market-oriented system and deciding how [...]