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Since 2004, in the Republic of Serbia incentives for credit support to entities active in sector of agriculture have been included in the agricultural policy measures. Although the national model for mentioned financial support has been changed over time, in essence it remains the same. The main goal of the paper is to analyze incentives derived from the national agricultural budget used for credit support of agriculture, i.e. to review the main characteristics of the current support model, while to recommend possible improvements. The research was based on desk research and descriptive methods, as well as on methods of analysis and synthesis. According to performed research, it can be concluded that the average share of incentives for credit support within the total incentives paid from national agricultural budget was less than 2% in analyzed period (2014-2022.). The average level of realized incentives in observed period was 73%, indicating the significant need of agricultural entities for subsidized loans. In order to develop agriculture in the Republic of Serbia, the authors suggest certain advancement of current model of credit support, considering possibilities for extension of repayment period and increase in upper value limit for investment loans. Besides, authors suggest the consideration of establishing a "specialized agricultural bank" as a state financial institution, which will provide comprehensive credit support covering the developmental requirements of domestic agricultural producers.

This study matches the digital financial inclusion index with micro panel data from the China Household Finance Survey (CHFS) in 2015, 2017, and 2019, and explores the impact of digital finance on the return rate of entrepreneurship. The results show that the effect is positive—entrepreneurial households in prefectures with higher digital finance obtain higher return rates—and remarkably reliable to a battery of endogeneity and robustness tests. Mechanism analysis indicates that the positive effect of digital finance on the return rate of entrepreneurship is achieved mainly through facilitating external financing and reducing financial transaction costs. Further research finds that the spillover effect of digital finance has obvious Internet bias: the "digital dividend" only extends to the advantaged classes who have access to the Internet—non-rural and migrating rural entrepreneurs, but for non-migrating rural entrepreneurs generally facing digital exclusion, digital finance has little effect on their return rate. The empirical evidence presented in this study has important policy implications for accelerating the digital finance process, promoting high-quality entrepreneurship development, and boosting digital poverty groups to break stratum solidification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• We study government support measures (GV) and firm environmental performance (EP). • Covid-19 and environmental data are obtained from Europe and Asian countries. • We analyze credit, cash transfers, fiscal exemptions, and wage subsidies. • Results show firms with higher EP are more likely to receive GV. • GV is not being subverted to support firms with low EP during the Covid-19 period. This paper investigates whether good firm environmental performance attracted government support. Furthermore, we explore the effect of different government measures such as access to new credit, cash transfers, fiscal exemptions or reductions, and wage subsidies. The COVID-19 data were collected from the COVID-19 follow-up survey, while environmental data are from the World Bank Enterprise Surveys. Our results show that 21% of the firms received wage subsidies, 10% received cash and exemption support and only 6% of firms received credit support. The results indicate that the probability of receiving government support increases if firms have a good environmental performance score. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]