Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Biofuels in developing countries'

The continued global reliance on fossil fuels with impact on resource depletion, human health, atmospheric pollution and environmental degradation has necessitated a global drive to integrate renewable fuels such as biodiesels. Biodiesels are described as “fuels composed of fatty acid methyl or ethyl esters and obtained from vegetable oils or animal fats”. Their use in energy generation could diversify the world’s energy mix, reduce fossil fuel dependence, reduce emissions and energy cost to bring about other economic benefits, especially for developing economies and rural communities with lack of adequate access to modern energy. A techno-economic and environmental life cycle assessment is however required to ensure that these fuels are fit for use in engines and meet any regulatory standard and sustainability criteria. This thesis has evaluated the use of Jatropha- and microalgae-biodiesel for power generation in two industrial gas turbines with open and combined cycle configuration. This was achieved using a techno-economic and environmental life cycle impact assessment framework. Comparative fuel assessments have been carried out between biodiesels and fossil fuels. Furthermore, the concept of microbial fuel degradation was examined in gas turbines. The thesis have identified Jatropha biodiesel as a worthwhile substitute for conventional diesel fuel, because it has close performance and emission characteristics to conventional diesel fuel with added advantage of being renewable. The consequent displacement of conventional diesel fuel with Jatropha biodiesel has significant environmental benefits. For economic viability and sustainability of gas turbine operated power plants, energy producers require a minimum monetary amount to recover the added cost of operating 100% Jatropha biodiesel. Other integration mechanisms are also available for utilizing the fuel in engines without compromising on plant’s economic performance. In worst case scenarios, where there are no government incentives, local conditions such as high life cycle cost of electricity, open opportunities for distributed and independent power generation from renewable fuels like Jatropha-biodiesel. Furthermore, this thesis has identified salient energy conversion processes that occur in gas turbine fuels, especially with biodiesels and developed a bio-mathematical model, Bio-fAEG to simulate these processes in gas turbines. This platform is a first step in quantifiable assessment and could enable a better understanding of microbial initiated processes.

Biofuel development has a strategic significance in various fields, including national energy security, climate change mitigation, environmental conservation and protection, as well as agricultural revival and rural development. The production and trade of biofuels have entered a new era of global growth, with both the scale of the industry and the number of countries involved reaching unprecedented levels. Developing countries have advantages over developed countries in biofuel production, as many of them have apparent relative availability of land and feedstocks, as well as good climate conditions in that biomass production potential is much higher and production costs can be lower. However, a biofuel expansion in these countries raises concerns about potential added environmental and socio-economic pressures. A massive scale-up in the production and use of biofuels could speed up deforestation and biodiversity loss, and possibly accelerate climate change, while creating a distortion on the traditional agricultural market and the emerging agro-energy market, and increasing the concentration of economic wealth. Against this background, the central aim of this thesis is to collate a variety of guidance, legislation and policies relevant to the regulation of biofuels in developing countries, to provide a comprehensive and coherent legislative and policy framework for these countries. As the rise of the biofuel economy has linked together many complicated environmental and social-legal relations in various topics, it is impossible to regulate biofuels within a single legal regime. In envisaging the legislative and policy framework for biofuel sustainability, it is necessary to consider and balance various values and interests from at least four legal areas, namely biotechnology development and diffusion, the environment, agro-energy economy, as well as trade liberalization on the biofuel market. Within the interdisciplinary regulatory framework, the biofuel industry in developing countries would not lead to a scenario in which it provided a solution to one specific problem/legal area, while creating many more in other legal areas. As a result, this regulatory framework will help policy makers to ensure that environmental and socio-economic sustainability considerations are taken into account in the production, promotion and consumption of biofuels, with a view to minimizing risks of negative impacts and maximizing benefits in the Global South, and in turn to benefit developing countries and the whole world in the immediate and long term.

Biofuels started to raise interest almost 40 years ago, when the Arab oil embargo pushed oil prices up and therefore spurred the research towards new forms of energy. Nevertheless, biofuel production has not really taken off until recently, when the combination of high oil prices, concern about greenhouse gas emissions, and the progressive reduction of oil reserves induced many countries across the world to implement policies encouraging biofuels production. At the beginning of the 2000s, biofuels were seen as a panacea for energy security (domestic energy source, highly reliable), economic stability (energy price stability, rural development, employment generation, reduce supply-demand gap for agricultural commodities), and for environment protection (better waste utilization, GHG emissions reduction), especially after the drawing up of the Kyoto protocol, according to which signatory countries had to reduce their GHG emissions by about 5% from their 1990 levels, by 2012. Biofuels are currently produced from agricultural commodities, therefore their repercussions on the agricultural and food sector might be substantial. In this framework it is clear that the responsibility that big countries (those able to affect world prices) have is substantial. Countries like the US, Brazil, and the EU have been encouraging biofuel production in recent years and ended up artificially creating a new market for agricultural commodities without fully understanding, a priori, the possible negative consequences of such decision. They decided to subsidize renewables because of the increased pressure by the public opinion towards greenhouse gas emissions reduction, reduce dependency on oil imports, and the need to meet the targets set by both the Kyoto protocol. Biofuel expansion took place not only in a controversial manner, without coordination at international level, but also in a critical historical moment. The past two decades have been characterized by a strong increase in world food demand, mainly due to economic expansion in emerging economies like China, India, Brazil, and some South East Asian countries. The strong increase in demand faces an agricultural supply that in the short period is inevitably inelastic, which results in higher prices and higher volatility (due to reduced stocks). Much of the initial enthusiasm towards biofuels has been declining in the last few years. First of all, biofuel expansion has increased the demand for many agricultural commodities, which, in a framework of increasing food demand in the world, triggered a sharp increase in agricultural prices with strong negative implications for poor people especially in developing countries. Many doubts have also been raised concerning the real effectiveness of biofuels in reducing GHG emissions. Emission-computing methodologies are not always accurate and sometimes are difficult to put in practice. Agriculture intensification and land use changes, both consequences of biofuel expansion, are two of the factors more likely to have increased GHG emissions rather than reduced. Furthermore, biofuel policies have been designed and implemented by countries on an individual basis, without the coordination at international level that would have been needed to avoid the numerous side-effects that biofuels have been having on international food markets and on the environment. My doctorate research analyzes all aspects of the biofuel sector at world level with special emphasis on its sustainability under an economic, environmental, and ethical point of view. The research starts with a description of what biofuels are and in which sub-categories they can be divided. Then, it provides a review of biofuel policies around the world and data on production, prices and trade. The work also provides figures on production, prices and trade of the main agricultural commodities used for biofuel production and the evolution of cropped and forest areas worldwide in the last twenty years. Main biofuel producers are the US, Brazil and the EU. In the first two countries is ethanol the main biofuel produced (obtained from corn in the US and from sugarcane in Brazil), while in the EU the leasing biofuel is biodiesel (from vegetable oils). In 2011, 51.8% of Brazilian sugarcane production and 42.2% of US corn production were used to produce ethanol. Areas cropped with sugarcane and corn, in the two countries were 4.2 and 15.5 million hectares in 2011, which correspond to 1.5% and 16% of total agricultural area respectively. By 2021 ethanol production will absorb almost 61% of Brazilian sugarcane production and 57% of US corn production, ceteris paribus. In 2021 the amount of land needed to grow all sugarcane needed to produce ethanol in Brazil will be more than 8 million hectares, almost equal to the entire current sugarcane area in the South American country. In the US the area that will be needed to cultivate corn for ethanol production will grow to slightly less than 20 million hectares, equal to 53% of current corn area in the US and 20% of current total agricultural area. These data highlight the different impact sugarcane- and corn-based ethanol have on agricultural production. Brazilian and American ethanol production was 22.9 and 52.8 million m3 in 2011 respectively, implying an “ethanol yield” of 5.5 m3/hectare for sugarcane ethanol and of 3.4 m3/hectare for corn-ethanol. This means that producing ethanol from sugarcane is more efficient and less consuming in terms of land than corn-ethanol. Considering also biodiesel, the amount of land needed to crop biofuel feedstocks, in Brazil and the US grows to 3 and 18.4% of total agricultural land. These areas are forecasted to increase to 6.3 and 23% by 2021, implying an increasing competition for land. In 2011 the EU used 5.4 million tons of domestically produced rapeseed oil and at least 3.9 million tons of imported palm oil to make biodiesel. The amount of land needed to grow rapeseed within the Union and oil palm in third countries (mainly Indonesia and Malaysia) was 5.2 and 1.3 million hectares respectively. The area needed to crop rapeseed for biodiesel production, in the EU, was equal to 5.2% of total agriculture area. Assuming that the percentage of rapeseed oil on total vegetable oil production in the EU will remain the same of 2011 and that the share of it employed in the food sector will also remain unchanged, it is possible to forecast that, in 2021, the EU will need 6.6 million tons of rapeseed oil and at least 10 million tons of palm oil from third countries to meet its consumption targets. This means that at least 3.4 million hectares of land, in South East Asia will be needed to produce palm oil destined to the EU. The core of the thesis is the analysis of the sustainability of biofuels on one hand, and of biofuels’ implications on food production on the other. The sustainability of biofuel production is analyzed through a literature review and re-interpretation of the existing literature on the topic, encompassing effects of mass biofuel production on the environment, GHG emissions, land use changes, water availability, and implications for developing countries. One of the most important aspects of biofuel sustainability is their effects on agricultural production and agricultural prices. The empirical part of this thesis employs econometric tools to assess the degree of integration between energy and agricultural markets in the main biofuel producing countries and price transmission elasticity between international and EU agricultural markets before and after the last reform of the CAP. In the US and in Brazil energy and agricultural prices move together in the long-run and the influence of oil prices has been growing over time. This means that policy-makers, in the future, will have to pay great attention to the mutual influence energy and agricultural policies can have on each other. In Europe this close relationship between energy and agricultural prices was not detected, however European agricultural markets have been influenced by biofuel policies in the US, and to a lesser extent Brazil, indirectly, through their effects on international commodity prices. What emerges from this work is that biofuels, in the current political, economic demographic, situation are, for many aspects, not sustainable. Side-effects of biofuel production are many and often even difficult to quantify. Solutions provided are often utopic or, even if good in theory, very difficult to implement. Biofuel production has been having negative effects on food production and prices, biodiversity and social welfare in the last decade, inside and outside the countries of production. The “original sin” was the initial lack of coordination between policies issued unilaterally by different countries, something that now seems extremely difficult to fix. Governments should, as it has been recently suggested by the United Nations, consider the option of modifying their biofuel programs because of their negative consequences on food security in many low-income countries. Also the promotion and implementation of biofuel policies in developing countries should be avoided as a measure for fostering development. It is very unlikely that rural poor will benefit from policies subsidizing the biofuel sector since most of the land in developing countries is owned by big multinational companies or by foreign states (land grabbing). The development of the biofuel sector would also increase food prices even in countries where such increase has been marginal so far because of scarce price transmission from the world market. Poor people living in urban areas would be worse off by higher food prices as well as small farmers who, in developing countries, are often net-purchasers of food. It has been suggested by many scholars and international organizations that, in order to become sustainable, biofuel production should shift from first-generation to second-generation technologies (those that allow the use of non-food crops or wastes for biofuel production). This will not be easy to achieve. Current second-generation biofuel production is still very small and will not grow substantially unless major investments are made by governments and, under the right conditions, private companies. Moreover it is not governments nor policy-makers who decides whether is profitable to put marginal land under cultivation and to crop non-food biofuel crops on it. Farmers are those making such decisions and they will not do it unless it is profitable. Current record-high agricultural commodity prices raise many doubts on the fact that farmers will shift from food to non-food crops without substantial government subsidies. An increase in subsidies to the agricultural sector, even just for energy crops, is unlikely to happen anytime soon because of the financial and economic crisis that hit many countries around the world and because of pressure by the WTO and other international organizations to reduce the degree of protection. In case it will be decided to keep subsidizing biofuels, new polices will have to be designed and implemented at world level, needing a very high degree of coordination between countries and flexibility, which is difficult to imagine can be reached in the short or even the medium term. An emblematic case, in this sense, is GHG emission accounting mechanisms that currently are based on life-cycle assessment analysis and that are often incomplete (i.e. limited to a single country or region) or unable to take all factors into account (i.e. indirect land-use changes). Research, in the next years, will have to focus on two main topics. On one hand second- and third-generation techniques for biofuel production will have to be refined and made economically (but also environmentally and socially) viable, possibly together with progressive reduction in the support in favor of first-generation biofuels. On the other hand, a better definition of the methodologies to assess the environmental, economic and social impacts of biofuel production will be crucial in order to correctly evaluate the sustainability of biofuel programs. In particular, the development of reliable methodologies to assess the environmental impact of biofuel production is very important since, in the future, subsidies could be calculated in a way to reward the production of biofuels able to provide (proved) positive externalities to the environment as well as increase social welfare.
Di biocarburanti si iniziò a parlare circa 40 anni fa, in concomitanza con la crisi petrolifera determinata dall’embargo da parte dei paesi OPEC. Il conseguente forte aumento del prezzo del petrolio stimolò infatti la ricerca nel campo delle forme di energia alternative. La produzione di biocarburanti è tuttavia decollata solo di recente, grazie all’azione combinata di molteplici fattori: elevate quotazioni del petrolio, necessità di contenere le emissioni di gas serra e la riduzione delle scorte di combustibili fossili; tutte cose che hanno indotto molti paesi a mettere a punto programmi volti allo sviluppo del settore dei biocarburanti. All’inizio degli anni 2000 i biocarburanti venivano considerati la soluzione ideale per risolvere i problemi dell’approvvigionamento energetico, della stabilità economica (stabilizzazione dei prezzi dell’energia, sviluppo rurale, creazione di posti di lavoro, aumento della domanda di materie prime agricole) e della protezione dell’ambiente (utilizzazione più efficiente dei rifiuti e riduzione delle emissioni di gas serra). Un impulso decisivo allo sviluppo delle politiche fu dato dalla stipula del Protocollo di Kyoto nel quale i paesi firmatari si impegnavano a ridurre le proprie emissioni di gas serra del 5% rispetto ai livelli del 1990 entro il 2012. Al momento attuale i biocarburanti vengono in larga parte prodotti a partire da materie prime agricole, quindi le ripercussioni della loro produzione sul settore agricolo possono essere rilevanti. In tale àmbito appare chiara la forte responsabilità, in termini di effetti sui mercati agricoli mondiali, che hanno i paesi che più di tutti hanno sovvenzionato il settore: Stati Uniti, Brasile e Unione Europea. Tali paesi, tramite le loro politiche, hanno creato un nuovo mercato di sbocco per molte materie prime agricole, senza capire a fondo, a priori, le conseguenze di tale azione. Le principali motivazioni addotte dai decisori politici per giustificare le sovvenzioni al settore dei biocarburanti furono la necessità di ottemperare ai dettami del Protocollo di Kyoto, aumentare l’indipendenza energetica, creare nuovi posti di lavoro, migliorare il reddito degli agricoltori e stabilizzare i prezzi dell’energia. L’espansione del settore dei biofuel è avvenuta non solamente in maniera quantomeno controversa, senza coordinazione a livello internazionale, ma anche in un momento storico molto delicato. Gli ultimi venti anni sono stati infatti caratterizzati da un grande aumento della domanda mondiale di cibo, soprattutto a causa della forte crescita economica dei cosiddetti paesi emergenti: Cina, India, Brasile e paesi del Sud-Est asiatico. Il forte aumento della domanda si scontra contro un’offerta di materie prime agricole giocoforza rigida nel breve termine, cosa che genera forti aumenti di prezzo e della volatilità delle quotazioni (soprattutto a causa del forte ridimensionamento delle scorte). Negli ultimi anni gran parte dell’entusiasmo iniziale nei confronti dei biocarburanti è andato scemando. Per prima cosa l’espansione del settore dei combustibili “verdi” ha aumentato la domanda per molte materie prime agricole che, in un contesto contraddistinto da un forte aumento della domanda mondiale, ha generato un sensibile aumento dei prezzi alimentari, con ripercussioni particolarmente negative per le fasce più povere della popolazione, soprattutto nei paesi meno sviluppati. Anche l’effettiva efficacia dei biocarburanti nel ridurre le emissioni di gas serra è stata fortemente messa in dubbio. Le metodologie utilizzare per il conteggio delle emissioni non sono sempre accurate o di facile attuazione. L’intensivizzazione dei processi agricoli e i cambiamenti d’uso dei suoli, entrambi conseguenza dell’aumento della produzione agricola, sono due fattori che molto probabilmente hanno causato un aumento delle emissioni di gas serra invece che una diminuzione. Inoltre, le politiche a favore del settore delle energie rinnovabili sono state progettate e messe in pratica in maniera spesso unilaterale da parte dei vari paesi, senza quella coordinazione a livello internazionale che sarebbe stata essenziale a evitare le conseguenze negative sui mercati agricoli e sull’ambiente. La mia ricerca di dottorato analizza tutti gli aspetti del settore dei biocarburanti a livello mondiale con particolare attenzione a quelli della sostenibilità: economica, ambientale e sociale. La ricerca inizia con una descrizione delle varie tipologie di biocarburanti attualmente prodotti a livello mondiale e prosegue con una rassegna delle politiche a favore dei biocarburanti nei principali paesi. In séguito vengono analizzate le produzioni, i prezzi e il commercio internazionale di biocarburanti e delle materie prime dalle quali sono ottenuti. I principali paesi produttori di biocarburanti sono gli Stati Uniti, il Brasile e l’Unione Europea. Nei primi due viene prodotto principalmente etanolo (a partire dal mais negli Stati Uniti e dalla canna da zucchero in Brasile), mentre nell’Unione Europea è il biodiesel il biocarburante di riferimento (prodotto a partire da oli vegetali). Nel 2011, il 51,8% della produzione brasiliana di canna da zucchero e il 42,2% di quella statunitense di mais sono state usate per produrre etanolo. Le superfici necessarie, nei due paesi, per la coltivazione della materia prima per la produzione del biocarburante sono state pari a 4,2 e 15,5 milioni di ettari, che rappresentano l’1,5 e il 16% della superficie agricola totale dei due paesi. Nel 2021, ceteris paribus, la produzione di etanolo assorbirà circa il 61% della produzione brasiliana di canna da zucchero e il 57% di quella statunitense di mais. Sempre nel 2021, in Brasile, le superfici necessarie per coltivare canna da zucchero destinata la settore dell’etanolo raggiungeranno gli 8 milioni di ettari, pari a tutta l’area attualmente coltivata a canna da zucchero nel paese sudamericano. Negli Stati Uniti le superfici necessarie a coltivare il granturco per la produzione di etanolo cresceranno fino a sfiorare i 20 milioni di ettari, un’estensione pari al 53% dell’area attualmente investita a mais e al 20% della superficie agricola totale del 2011. Da questi dati è possibile osservare la forte differenza, in termini di impatto sulle produzioni agricole, tra la produzione di etanolo brasiliana (imperniata sulla canna da zucchero) e quella statunitense (basata sul mais). La produzione brasiliana e statunitense di etanolo, nel 2011, è stata rispettivamente di 22,9 e 52,8 milioni di metri cubi, implicando una “resa” in etanolo di 5,5 e 3,4 metri cubi a ettaro. Ciò significa che la produzione di etanolo a partire dalla canna da zucchero è più efficiente in termini di superfici necessarie alla coltivazione della materia prima. Tenendo in considerazione anche il biodiesel, in rapida espansione in entrambi i paesi (dove viene ottenuto a partire dall’olio di soia), l’incidenza percentuale delle superfici utilizzate per coltivare la materia prima per la produzione di biocarburanti (etanolo e biodiesel) cresce fino a raggiungere il 3% del totale della superficie agricola in Brasile e il 18,4% negli Stati Uniti. Tali percentuali sono destinate a raggiungere il 6,3 e il 23% entro il 2021. Nel 2011 l’Unione Europea ha impiegato 5,4 milioni di tonnellate di olio di colza (prodotto all’interno dell’Unione) e almeno 3,9 milioni di olio di palma (importato da Indonesia e Malesia) per produrre biodiesel. Le superfice necessaria, all’interno dell’UE, per la coltivazione della colza usata nel settore dei biocarburanti è stata di 5,2 milioni di ettari nel 2011, mentre quella impiegata per la produzione di olio di palma nei paesi terzi di almeno 1,3 milioni di ettari. Sempre nel 2011, il 5,2% della superficie agricola totale dell’Unione è stato utilizzato per la coltivazione di colza da destinare alla produzione di biocarburanti. Assumendo che la percentuale di olio di colza impiegata nel settore alimentare nell’Unione Europea rimarrà la stessa anche negli anni a venire, è possibile prevedere che, nel 2021, l’UE avrà bisogno di 6,6 milioni di tonnellate di olio di colza e di almeno 10 milioni di tonnellate di olio di palma (importato da paesi terzi) per raggiungere i suoi obiettivi di consumo in materia di biodiesel. Ciò implica che almeno 3,4 milioni di ettari di terreni, presumibilmente in Indonesia e Malesia, saranno necessari per produrre tutto l’olio di palma di cui il settore del biodiesel comunitario avrà bisogno. Il fulcro di questa tesi è l’analisi della sostenibilità della produzione di biocarburanti e le sue conseguenze sulla produzione di materie prime agricole. La sostenibilità dei biocarburanti viene esaminata attraverso una revisione della letteratura esistente sull’argomento, con particolare enfasi sugli effetti della forte espansione del settore dei carburanti “verdi” sull’ambiente, sulle emissioni di gas serra, i cambiamenti d’uso del suolo, la disponibilità idrica e le implicazioni per i paesi in via di sviluppo. In termini di sostenibilità, uno degli aspetti più importanti riguarda gli effetti del forte aumento della produzione di biofuel sulla produzione e sui prezzi delle materie prime agricole. Questa tesi, nella sua parte empirica, utilizza tecniche econometriche per misurare il livello di integrazione tra i mercati energetici e quelli agricoli nei principali paesi produttori. Viene inoltre anche stimata l’elasticità di trasmissione dei prezzi tra il mercato mondiale e quello comunitario nel caso delle principali materie prime agricole, prima e dopo l’ultima riforma della Politica agricola comune (Riforma Fischler). Negli Stati Uniti e in Brasile i prezzi agricoli e quelli dell’energia (petrolio ed etanolo) condividono il medesimo trend di lungo periodo, con l’influenza del prezzo del petrolio che è andata crescendo negli ultimi anni. Ciò implica che i decisori politici dovranno, in futuro, prestare grande attenzione agli effetti che le politiche energetiche hanno sui mercati agricoli e viceversa. In Europa non è stato possibile dimostrare la presenza di una relazione diretta tra prezzi agricoli e prezzo del petrolio, tuttavia è possibile affermare che i mercati agricoli europei subiscano le conseguenze delle politiche a favore dei biocarburanti di altri paesi, in particolare degli Stati Uniti, in maniera indiretta, cioè tramite l’effetto di tali politiche sui prezzi internazionali. Ciò che merge da questo lavoro è che i biocarburanti, nella situazione economica, politica e demografica attuale, sono, per molti aspetti, non sostenibili. Gli effetti collaterali della produzione di biofuel sono numerosi e spesso difficili da quantificare. Le soluzioni proposte dalla letteratura sono spesso utopiche o, seppur corrette dal punto di vista teorico, molto difficili da applicare. L’espansione del settore dei biocarburanti sta avendo effetti negativi sulla produzione e sui prezzi delle materie prime agricole, sulla biodiversità e sul benessere sociale, sia all’interno dei principali paesi produttori che all’esterno di essi. Il “peccato originale” è stato la mancanza di coordinazione iniziale tra le varie politiche, progettate e messe in pratica in maniera unilaterale dai vari paesi; una cosa alla quale, oggi, è molto difficile porre rimedio. I governi dovrebbero, come è stato recentemente raccomandato dalle Nazioni Unite, considerare la possibilità di modificare in maniera sostanziale i propri programmi di sviluppo del settore dei biocarburanti a causa soprattutto delle pesanti conseguenze che hanno sulla sicurezza alimentare nei paesi a basso reddito. Per questa ragione l’utilizzo dei biocarburanti come misura volta a stimolare lo sviluppo nei paesi poveri dovrebbe essere evitata. È altamente improbabile che i poveri nelle zone rurali traggano alcun beneficio dallo sviluppo del settore dei biocarburanti nei loro paesi poiché gran parte della terra è posseduta da grandi compagnie multinazionali o, in alcuni casi, da paesi terzi (land grabbing). Lo sviluppo del settore dei biocarburanti nei paesi in via di sviluppo contribuirebbe, dall’interno, a mantenere elevati i prezzi dei generi alimentari anche dove finora tale effetto, a causa del basso livello di trasmissione dei prezzi agricoli mondiali, è stato marginale. L’aumento dell’inflazione alimentare causato dalla produzione di biocarburanti avrebbe effetti negativi sia sui poveri delle aree urbane che sue quelli delle aree rurali poiché in molti casi i piccoli coltivatori, nei paesi in via di sviluppo, sono compratori netti di generi alimentari. Molti studi, anche da parte di organizzazioni governative internazionali, mettono in risalto il fatto che la produzione di biocarburanti possa diventare sostenibile solo attraverso lo sviluppo delle cosiddette tecnologie di seconda o terza generazione (cioè quelle che permettono l’uso di materia prima non-food per la produzione di biocarburanti) e l’uso di terreni degradati e marginali per la coltivazione delle materie prime. Tuttavia, tutto ciò è di difficile realizzazione. Attualmente i biocarburanti di seconda o terza generazione sono ancora in fase di sviluppo e la loro produzione non crescerà in maniera sostanziale se non tramite forti investimenti da parte dei vari governi e, in determinate circostanze, di investitori privati. Va ricordato che non sono i governi quelli che decidono se la coltivazione di materia prima per la produzione di biocarburanti in aree degradate o marginali sia economicamente conveniente: sono infatti i coltivatori quelli che prendono le decisioni ed essi non lo faranno se non vi troveranno alcun beneficio economico. L’attuale livello, molto elevato, dei prezzi agricoli pone seri dubbi sul fatto che i coltivatori siano disposti a passare dalla produzione di materie prime food a quelle non-food in assenza di forti incentivi pubblici in tal senso. Tuttavia, un aumento del livello di supporto all’agricoltura, anche solo nel caso delle colture energetiche, difficilmente avverrà nel breve termine, a causa soprattutto della crisi economica, che ha ristretto i budget di spesa di molti paesi, e le pressioni, in sede WTO, per una riduzione del livello di protezione dei mercati. Nel caso in cui si decida di mantenere gli aiuti di stato al settore dei biocarburanti, sarà necessario progettare e sviluppare nuove politiche, questa volta a livello sovranazionale, cosa che implicherebbe un elevato livello di coordinazione e di flessibilità tra i vari paesi, oltre che difficile da raggiungere nel breve o medio termine. Un caso emblematico, in tal senso, è rappresentato dalle metodologie di conteggio delle emissioni di gas serra che sono attualmente basate sull’analisi del ciclo di vita e che sono molto spesso incomplete (limitate, ad esempio, a determinati paesi o regioni) o ancora non in grado di considerare il ruolo di tutti i fattori (es. cambiamenti indiretti d’uso del suolo). La ricerca, negli anni a venire, dovrà focalizzarsi su due argomenti principali. Da una parte, le tecniche di produzione dei biocarburanti di seconda e terza generazione dovranno essere raffinate, rese economicamente convenienti e sostenibili dal punto di vista sociale e ambientale. Possibilmente ciò dovrà avvenire di pari passo con la progressiva riduzione del livello di supporto ai biocarburanti di prima generazione. Dall’altra parte, sarà necessario definire meglio le metodologie di quantificazione dell’impatto dei biocarburanti in termini ambientali, economici e sociali, in modo da determinare con certezza la loro sostenibilità e da consentire lo sviluppo di politiche più appropriate. In particolare, la messa a punto di metodologie affidabili per la valutazione dell’impatto dei vari biocarburanti è molto importante poiché, in futuro, le sovvenzioni potrebbero essere calcolate in maniera tale da premiare la produzione di quei biocarburanti in grado di fornire esternalità positive per l’ambiente e il benessere sociale.

Considerando-se este importante momento de transição em que as tradicionais matrizes energéticas são paulatinamente substituídas por um conjunto de fontes renováveis, das quais os biocombustíves sobressaem-se pela capacidade de contribuir para o meio ambiente, trazendo igualmente benefícios econômicos e sociais a seus produtores; o presente trabalho visa contribuir para o panorama energético global que se começa a se delinear. Diante da impotência do Estado em lidar hodiernamente com determinadas questões, testemunha-se a participação de atores privados (organizações não governamentais, empresas transnacionais e sociedade civil, entre outros) atuando como vetores na transmissão de compromissos internacionais junto a estruturas nacionais para a solução de problemas comuns da humanidade. A essa nova arquitetura jurídica e política convencionou-se designar de governança global. Diante da inexistência de uma governança energética global que opere no interesse de países importadores, exportadores e investidores do setor de energia, agindo também como promotora de desenvolvimento social e econômico junto a países em desenvolvimento; e, por fim, em face da ausência de uma regulação internacional exclusiva na área energética, o presente estudo se dedica a investigar as possibilidades de disciplinamento do comércio internacional dos biocombustíveis. Admitindo-se o relevante desempenho que o Brasil detém na produção e exportação deste produto, inclusive na área tecnológica, a presente tese busca identificar o foro adequado, condições justas de produção, investimento, concessão de subsídios, adoção de medidas técnicas, de compra e venda, concorrência entre outros itens que o tema relaciona.
When considering this important transitional moment in which the traditional energy matrices are gradually replaced by a mix of renewable sources, among which biofuels stand out: for its ability of contributing to the preservation of the environment and of generating economic benefits to its producers; this work aims to contribute with the energy landscape that is starting to take shape. Due to the current State incapacity in dealing with a specific set of questions, one witnesses the contribution of non-governmental actors (such as non governmental organizations, transnational companies and civil society, among others) side by side with national structures in order to solve widespread human problems. Regarding the lack of global energy governance that may operate in the interest of importers, exporters and investors in the energy sector, who should act as a promoter of social and economic development vis a vis developing countries; and, finally, considering the absence of a multilateral energy agreement, the present work aims to investigate the possibilities of possible regulation of international biofuels trade. Hence, admitting the excellent performance that Brazil withholds in the production and exportation of this product, also in the technological area, the present thesis seeks the adequate forum as well as to preview fair conditions for production, investment, subsidies concession, adoptions of technical standards in distribution, trade and competition amongst other law related issues.

Advanced technology plays a more and more important role in economic growth. With increasing international transactions, technology spillover between countries is becoming more important for especially developing countries. The main objective of this essay is to investigate the relationship between labor productivity and technological spillovers measured by Foreign Direct Investments (FDI), import and Research and Development expenditure (R&D). We use data covering 41 developing countries for the time period 2005 to 2008 to assess the extent to which technological spillovers from US influence labor productivity in the selected developing countries. Our results show that the relationship between technological spillovers and labor productivity in developing countries are highly sensitive to model specification and estimation techniques. Simple pooled data estimations revels a clear relation between technological spillover an labor productivity while more complex models such as  dynamic panel data models fails in this task.

This thesis basic aim is to have a better understanding of how labour markets work and to explore different transmission mechanisms that might be responsible for making these markets different from their counterparts in the developed world. I analyzed problems created by large public sector employment by using two different frameworks and I made an empirical study about the social factors related to gender issues. In the second chapter, the government's excess employment in the economy is placed under the efficiency wage framework. It is aimed to find out how the wage and effort differentials between public and private sectors actually affect the labour market or more specifically equilibrium levels of employment, wages and productivity. The chapter investigates how the total welfare responds to changes in these differentials in terms of two different models. The results show that an effort of raising employment by the government eventually leads to a reduction in the total welfare by curbing private employment. This chapter contributes to the existing literature by providing a different approach by defining an explicit outside option, namely the government sector, to the efficiency wage theory. Another aspect analyzed is the relation between public sector employment and output growth. In chapter three, I try to establish a link between the government employment and economic growth rate underlying several mechanisms; distortionary taxes, productive government expenditure and productivity link resulting from the interaction of government and private labour markets inspiring from the efficiency wage theory. I endogenize the growth rate by introducing a public sector capital term in government expenditures. The production function in the growth model is constructed such that productivity of private worker decreases when size of public employment increases. I concluded that the abundant government employment force private sector either to pay higher wages or to have lower productivity of labour as outside option for the workers are now plenty. While higher wage leads more unemployment, productivity decline causes output to reduce. Developing countries social dynamics have unforeseen consequences on the labour markets. Thus, in order to understand the social and traditional values explaining the employment decisions taken by the labour force in the developing countries, in the fourth chapter of this thesis an empirical study is carried out to investigate the existence of and the potential behavioral change in son preference in Turkey, by using different statistical techniques. The main contribution of this part is that, it provides a broad analysis of son preference behavior in Turkey by using the latest econometric techniques. In particular, it investigates whether the process of urbanization and modernization in Turkey had an effect on son preference behavior over time. The results imply that there is clear and strong son preference in Turkey and the difference between progression ratios of families with and without sons is larger in 1993 compared to 1998. It is also found that the regional effects are more dominant on childbearing decision and urbanization had a diminishing effect on son preference behavior in Turkey.

Chapter one presents a critical and detailed review of the stochastic frontier methodology from a macro-data perspective.  The advantages over the standard growth accounting approach are emphasised, and the main features of the translog production function, used throughout the thesis, are discussed. Chapter two uses the stochastic frontier approach to estimate different specifications of the production function, technological catch-up (efficiency improvements) and technological change (shifts in the production frontier) for 57 developing countries over the period 1960-1990.  It is well known that alternative specifications of the production function lead to ambiguous empirical evidence for competing theories of economic growth (Durlauf and Quah 1999).  Therefore, tests are performed to find the specification in line with the data under analysis.  Then the important issue of the role of human capital in the process of economic growth is also investigated, since it is not yet unambiguously determined (Islam 1995, p.1154).  Chapter three analyses the results based on Model 4* (Chapter 2) in more detail to provide a consistent decomposition of output growth.  The evolution of the entire distribution of the growth and productivity sources is analysed and a formal test for assessing the importance of growth factors is performed. With respect to regression analysis, this approach is likely to be more informative (Quah, 1996a,b, 1997).  The base of both the test and the visual analysis is the non-parametric kernel density estimator. The findings in the previous chapters motivate Chapter 4 of the thesis, which further explores the relative importance of FDI, imports of capital goods and human capital accumulation in the development process.

This thesis is a collection of three essays, each of which analyses an economic institution in one or more developing countries. A careful analysis of institutions is crucial for the understanding of economic performance and for the design of effective policy measures. In the first essay, "On the Structure of Tenancy Contracts" I analyse the effect of crop and tenant characteristics on the form and on the length of tenancy contracts. Using a principal-agent model I show that highpowered incentives are used when, due to the characteristics of the crop, their benefit is high and/or when, due to the characteristics of the tenant, their cost is low. The theoretical predictions are consistent with the empirical evidence from a unique data set of 705 contracts. The purpose of the second essay, "Competing for Protection: Land Fragmentation and the Rise of Mafia in 19th Century Sicily", is to identify the conditions that fostered the development of the mafia. I argue that in the context of 19th century Sicily, land fragmentation was crucial for the rise of mafia. Using a menu-auction model I show that, by inducing landlords' competition for protection, land fragmentation increases the profits of mafia groups even if the assets in need of protection are unchanged. I show that the predictions of the theory are consistent with the available empirical evidence from a sample of 70 Sicilian villages. In the third essay, "Does Financial Reform Raise or Reduce Savings?", we analyse the effect of financial liberalisation on private savings in eight developing countries. To this purpose we construct an index which summarises the reform process and estimate an error correction model for savings. We find that the effect of financial reform on savings is ambiguous
Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 1999
Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences
Discipline: Economics

Abstract This paper is a contribution to the discussion on Innovation for Development. It is argued that innovation strategies in developing countries are the result of competing policy and contextual factors. In exploring this theme, it suggests that innovation strategies which are shaped by domestic market and policy realities are more robust and contribute towards improving the country-level performance of enterprises. The paper has seven sections which include a brief review of the literature related to innovation strategies in developing countries; a small discussion of success factors and policies of countries that offer good experiences and lessons in applying innovation strategies; a part on what policy implications to draw from the literature and the success stories for less developed countries; and a final section on the role of the donor countries in facilitating the implementation of the innovation strategies. The paper puts forward some tentative conclusions that summarise what has been learnt from the paper and affirms that the innovation-systems based strategies are indeed internationally replicable. The resulting policy and developmental frameworks will invariably exhibit high levels of variation. These differences emerge primarily from the systemic approach encouraged by the use of innovation policy. Secondly, the innovation-systems approaches ensure adaptability whilst maintaining methodological rigour. It also enables comparability and thereby also promotes appropriate and relevant benchmarking. Finally, the innovation-systems paradigm has a normative capacity to dynamically absorb and respond to the needs and demands of locally-specified domestic contexts.

Modern literature has many research in the field of entrepreneurship, but most of them do not explain the characteristics of entrepreneurial activity in developing countries. Thus, this research uses  regression analysis of panel data for the cross-country analysis of factors influence the level of entrepreneurial activity in 52 developing countries. The paper provides empirical information about the individual characteristics, regulatory standards countries, as well as some macroeconomic indicators. Individual factors (gender, age), indicators of respondents’ self-evaluation and assessment of the environment, in which they are located have a significant impact on entrepreneurial activity in developing economies. In terms of macroeconomic indicators, it was concluded on the positive effects of GDP growth and the lack of impact of unemployment on the level of entrepreneurial activity.

My thesis will focus on risk management practically in developing countries. In this research study, first a literature review about the concept of risk management and its concerns is provided which is the output of extensive review of resources such as journal papers, books and research studies. Then a case study will be reviewed in Iran which is considered as a developing country. In this step, the researcher attempts to extract needed information for her research based on the theory of frames. After gathering needed information the findings which are extracted from practical environment are compared to the academics material to answer the questions which are defined in the primary steps. Meanwhile, the main purpose of this study is reviewing the conditions of work environment in developing countries and extract main concerns and compare them to the standards, methodologies and tools and techniques of risk management to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of using these tools in performing risk management in developing countries.

Over the last ten years there has been a renewed interest in providing agricultural insurance in developing countries. However, voluntary demand for unsubsidised insurance products has been low, particularly from the poorest farmers. Chapter One presents a model of rational demand for hedging products, where there is a risk of contractual nonperformance. Demand is characterised and bounded for risk averse and decreasing absolute risk averse decision makers. For constant absolute and relative risk averse utility functions, demand is hump-shaped in the degree of risk aversion when the price is actuarially unfair, first increasing then decreasing, and either decreasing or decreasing-increasing-decreasing in risk aversion when the price is actuarially favourable. The apparently low level of demand for consumer hedging instruments, particularly from the most risk averse, is explained as a rational response to deadweight costs and the risk of contractual nonperformance. A numerical example is presented which suggests that some of the unsubsidised weather derivatives currently being designed for and marketed to poor farmers may in fact be poor products. Chapter Two presents experimental evidence collected from a framed microinsurance lab experiment using poor subjects in rural Ethiopia. In line with the theoretical model of Chapter One, demand for actuarially unfair index insurance is hump-shaped in wealth, first increasing then decreasing. In contrast with recent field experiments where it is not possible to demonstrate that low demand for indexed insurance is `too low', use of a laboratory experiment with an objectively known joint probability distribution allows normative statements to be made about the observed level of demand. The observed level of demand for index insurance in the experiment is higher than the decreasing absolute risk averse upper bound of Chapter One, suggesting that subjects bought `too much' index insurance. Chapter Three presents a vision of insurance design for the poor. Technically optimal arrangements involve insurance providers, such as microinsurers or governments, acting as reinsurer to groups of individuals who have access to cheap information about each other, such as extended families or members of close-knit communities, who in turn offer mutual insurance to each other.

This Master's thesis focuses on nation branding in developing countries. Nation branding is an emerging discipline that aims to build and improve a nation's image through the application of marketing techniques. The aim of the thesis is to contextualize the nation branding of developing countries within the broader framework of the theory and practice of nation branding and development studies. The thesis is structured into three chapters. The first chapter offers an introduction into the theory and practice of nation branding and the critique attached to it. The second chapter then looks at how nation branding fits into the wider context of development studies, and the scale of its relevance for developing countries with a special focus on its application for export, FDI and tourism promotion and its significance in development co-operation. The last chapter is dedicated to case studies of application of nation branding in two developing countries: Uruguay and Thailand. The conclusion sums up the results.

Thesis (B.S.)--California Polytechnic State University, 2009.
Project advisor: Benjamin F. Timms. Title from PDF title page; viewed on Jan. 14, 2010. Includes bibliographical references. Also available on microfiche.

The technology is among the important tools for sustainable development in the world. The way is spread in various countries is somehow dissimilar according the economic resources of each country. It is for that reason our work focuses on the use of technology in different countries with a particular attention to developing countries. The technology on which we underscored is wireless system, as emphasized by many examples is nowadays more used than wired system thanks to its advantages in deployment and utilization. In order to analyze how wireless systems are used in developing countries certain methodologies are adopted. At first sight, the current use of wireless systems in developing world is shown with the aid of a table. Above all, we have also considered the architecture of wireless systems where through a project aimed to make intelligibility tests an architecture is designed and implemented with wireless equipments. Among the principal methods for the transmission of data in wireless systems, the multicast transmission is analyzed with greater interest through the protocols and algorithms most important. This study suggests that the multicast transmission makes better use of wireless systems. Taking into account the best utilization of wireless system, it is obviously clear that this technology would not be well utilized and exploited when the frequency is not well managed. Therefore, a study concerning the spectrum management, spectrum cost and methodologies applicable in both developed and developing countries is carried out which further availed to suggest a better frequency utilization in developing countries. At the end of this work it is observed that the use of wireless technologies is moving forward rapidly in developing countries as indicated by the rapid growth of mobile phone users and other wireless technologies. The implementation of new technologies is easier in these countries as it does not require an upgrade from old to new technologies which sometimes seems impossible or demands expensive and a lot of work. Several conclusions are then drawn for particular cases.

Electronic waste, also called e-waste, are various forms of electrical and electronic equipment (EEE) that have ceased to be of value to their users or no longer satisfy their original purpose. E-waste products have exhausted their utility value through either redundancy, replacement, or breakage and include both “white goods” such as refrigerators, washing machines, and microwaves and “brown goods” such as televisions, radios, computers, and cell phones. Given that the technology revolution has exponentially increased the use of new electronic equipment, it has also produced growing volumes of obsolete products; e-waste is one of the fastest-growing waste streams. Although e-waste contains complex combinations of highly toxic substances that pose a danger to health and the environment, many of the products also contain recoverable precious materials, making it a different kind of waste compared with traditional municipal waste. Globally, e-waste constitutes more than 5 percent of all municipal solid waste and is increasing with the rise of sales of electronic products in developing countries. Most of the world’s e-waste is recycled in developing countries, where informal and hazardous setups for the extraction and sale of metals are common. Recycling companies in developed countries face strict environmental regulatory regimes and an increasing cost of waste disposal and thus may find exportation to small traders in developing countries more profitable than recycling in their own countries. There is also a significant illegal transboundary movement of e-waste in the form of donations and charity from rich industrialized nations to developing countries. E-waste profiteers can harvest substantial profits owing to lax environmental laws, corrupt officials, and poorly paid workers, and there is an urgent need to develop policies and strategies to dispose of and recycle e-waste safely to achieve a sustainable future.

Along with international trade, foreign direct investment (FDI) has been the engine driving the current economic globalization of the world economy. The growth rate of FDI, which exceeded that of international trade and world output throughout the 1990s, raises important questions regarding the value of FDI to developing countries as host countries to FDI and the role it can play in their development.
In an attempt to answer these questions, this thesis tackles the main issues underlining FDI and developing countries. After analysing the pros and cons of FDI for developing countries and other interested parties, this thesis scrutinizes the regulation of FDI as a means to balance the interests of the concerned parties, giving an assessment of the balance of interests in some existing and potential FDI regulations. Furthermore, this thesis highlights the case against the deregulation of FDI and its consequences for developing countries. It concludes by formulating regulatory FDI guidelines for developing.

This thesis analyses four aspects of migration in developing countries with uncel1ainty as the critical feature. First, we consider the effects of uncertainty on the decision to migrate. Our findings show that uncertainty matters in the timing of migration by bringing it forward or delaying it depending on the source of uncertainty. Uncertainty results in cautious behaviour by households, which explains why, in spite of observing huge wage differentials between regions, the scale of migration appears relatively small. Income differentials are thus not sufficient for migration. Second, we build on the uncertainty in the area of migrant origin by analysing the relationship between vulnerability to poverty and migration. We develop a conceptual framework that identities the uncertainty of migration outcomes as an important variable in affecting household vulnerability, even though migration is widely regarded as a strategy to offset the risk of falling into poverty. Third, we consider how the poor finance their migration. We develop an interlinked contract in which migrant households can borrow form richer households. Our model explains the empirical observation that migration rates by the very poor from villages with high inequalities are high even though the poor are generally prevented from migration because of the costs. The uncertainty of lending to a household with no collateral for migration, which itself is uncertain, is overcome through the interlinked contract. Fourth, we show that migration has a signalling effect. which can reveal infom1ation on the quality of skilled migrants. There is uncertainty on migrant productivity that is only resolved by migration. Thus the information generated can he used to develop modern sectors in the sending region if migration results in favourable outcomes. The thesis makes a theoretical and methodological contribution in the analysis of these four aspects.

This thesis consists of three essays examining different aspects relevant to the banking sectors of developing economies. The first two essays focus on Emerging Europe a region with one of the highest foreign bank presence in the world - to study the impact of foreign bank ownership and bank organizational structure on the cost of financial intermediation and terms of loan contracts. The last essay focuses on Kenya which is home to M-Pesa the mobile-phone based money trans-fer and financing service initially launched in Kenya in 2007 and subsequently in other emerging countries such as Albania, Romania, India, Egypt and several other African countries - to examine its impact on the performance and outreach of commercial banks. The first essay investigates the impact of foreign bank entry, home and host country conditions on net interest margins (NIMs), using a newly collected panel dataset with ownership information for 265 banks operating in nine Southeast European countries over the period 1995 2011. As the banking sector of many emerging markets and in particular the European transition economies have been dominated by foreign banks understanding the impact of such reforms on host country banking sectors is important for designing supportive policies. We do not find evidence of foreign bank entry having a beneficial effect for host countries in terms of reducing the cost of financial intermediation in the long run, as foreign banks change their behaviour over time. We show that foreign banks have initially lower NIMs compared to domestic banks, however this effect weakens the larger the foreign presence and the more established foreign banks become. We find that home country regulation and supervision have an effect on bank behaviour, with foreign banks coming from countries with stricter regulation having higher NIMs in host countries. The second essay studies the impact of institutions on bank organizational hierarchy. Studying the internal organizational structure of banks is important as it determines the type of information acquired and used in lending decisions and consequently the type of borrowers banks lend to. This is important not only for bank's loan portfolio composition and their financial soundness but also for borrower's ability to access funds on favourable terms and the overall financial system stability and economic development. Using a unique bank-level survey dataset covering 32 countries and 611 banks, we introduce a new and direct measure of organizational hierarchy and exploit the distinctive feature of multi-national banks which face different institutional environments in the countries they operate. We find that the same parent bank is more likely to grant decision-making authority to its foreign affiliates operating in countries with stronger institutions compared to those operating in weaker institutional environments. Combining the bank- with firm-level data we further find that a strong institutional environment which favours a decentralized organizational structure leads to better lending terms to SMEs decentralized banks grant loans with longer maturities, lower interest rates and are less likely to require collateral compared to their centralized counterparts. These findings further our understanding of bank organizational structure as a channel through which law affects lending. In the last essay we use the advent of the mobile money innovation in Kenya in 2007 as an interesting laboratory to investigate the impact of a financial innovation on the performance and outreach of commercial banks. Providing more insights about this link is important as it helps inform the debate among policy-makers and regulators on the impact of a non-traditional source of competition on the service provision of formal financial institutions. Given that financial inclusion is a major problem in developing countries, detailed micro-level evidence on this issue is important for promoting household welfare. Combining the 2006, 2009 and 2013 FinAccess household surveys with bank financial statement and branch penetration data at the county level we find that banks more exposed to the competitive pressure induced by the mobile money innovation improved their performance and expanded their outreach towards households traditionally excluded by formal financial institutions. Additional results further show that households report less supply side barriers to financial access in counties more exposed to the advent of the mobile money innovation. These results highlight the importance of increasing the contestability of banking markets in order to promote financial inclusion and a more competitive banking sector.

Thesis: Ph. D. in Engineering Systems, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, School of Engineering, Institute for Data, Systems, and Society, 2017.
Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.
Includes bibliographical references.
There is no definitive blueprint for ending poverty and increasing prosperity across the globe, but the World Bank argues that inclusive economic growth is critical to achieving global development goals. This thesis focuses on supply chain financing, and its potential to make a positive and lasting impact on people and businesses in resource-constrained environments. It seeks to develop a better understanding of how supply chain and finance structures impact profits, sales growth and risk. The two-phased research design seeks to address the gap in the supply chain and development literature on supply chain finance in small and medium sized firms in developing countries. The first phase consists of exploratory, semi-structured interviews with stakeholders in international development, financing and supply chain management. The exploratory interviews were used to develop an understanding of how relevant stakeholders think about and make supply chain finance decisions. Additionally, the interviews were used to identify a company and supply chain for a multiple case study upon which the second phase of research is based. The company is a clean energy product distributor that has partnered with one of the largest banks in Kenya to provide consumer financing for clean energy products. The case analysis includes an in-depth examination of the company's financial performance by sales channel, drawing upon sales records and accounting documents. Interviews were conducted with the company's management, suppliers, sales force, retailers and bank lending agents. The mixed methods case study is used to extend hypotheses developed during the exploratory interviews and further develop theory on the role of financing in developing country supply chains. The exploratory interviews and case study are used to develop a framework of how stakeholders in consumer durable goods markets think about scale in developing countries. The World Bank's Logistics Performance Index (LPI) and Doing Business Report (DBR) data sets are used to demonstrate how organizations can base supply chain decisions on infrastructure, logistics and governance structures within a country. This research can be used by for-profit and not-for-profit entities when making resource allocation and supply chain design decisions in developing markets.
by Timothy W. Breitbach.
Ph. D. in Engineering Systems

Thesis (S.B.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, 2006.
Includes bibliographical references (leaves 34-35).
Despite the problems with obesity that the United States is facing today, malnutrition, caused in part by severely low dietary fat consumption, remains a problem among many people living in Sub-Saharan Africa. According to the World Health Organization, one third of people in developing countries are malnourished as well as vitamin or mineral deficient. While villagers do not have access to commercially produced vegetable oil (a common source of dietary fat), nor are industrial scale oil extraction methods appropriate for small scale production. As a result, they turn to traditional methods, such as a mortar and pestle, to extract oil from peanuts, sunflower seeds, and other oil bearing seeds and nuts. This process is both time and labor intensive, and still does not yield sufficient amounts of oil to satisfy the need for it. The need for a small scale press is clear. This thesis introduces a simple design which achieves a yield of 46.9 mL per cup (U.S.) which matches the yield produced using industrial technologies. This corresponds to 153% increase in yield and 38.5% increase in rate over using traditional methods such as a mortar and pestle. The design consists of two fixed plates connected by four rods, with a third plate which slides along the four guide rods.
(cont.) A standard scissor jack is the mechanism by which the necessary pressure of 800-1000 psi is generated to extract the oil. A peanut container with a removable bottom holds the peanuts as they are pressed, and holes drilled into its cylindrical face allow the oil to spill out into a collection dish underneath the container. The entire design is compact, with a footprint of one square foot and a height of 22 inches. This is 12 times smaller than the Beilenberg ram press, the standard for small scale presses currently used in developing countries. Experimental results of the loading profile as function of time show that the jack does not need to be turned continuously once the oil begins to appear. This requires significantly less strength than current methods of oil extraction. Although future work is recommended to further develop and improve the press, it shows promise of alleviating the need for such a device in many impoverished parts of the world.
by Neera Jain and Somin Lee.
S.B.

Thesis: Ph. D., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Economics, 2016.
Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.
Includes bibliographical references (pages 223-231).
This thesis consists of three chapters on microeconomic issues of firms in developing countries and the impact of government policies on business growth. The first chapter examines firms' incentive to establish a reputation for quality. A key problem in developing countries is the lack of reliable provision of high quality goods and services. I designed an experiment to understand this phenomenon in a setting that features typical market conditions in a developing country: the retail watermelon market in a major Chinese city. I begin by demonstrating empirically that there is substantial asymmetric information between sellers and buyers on sweetness, the key indicator of quality for watermelons, yet sellers do not sort and price watermelons by quality. I then randomly introduce one of two branding technologies into 40 out of 60 markets-one sticker label that is widely used and often counterfeited and one novel laser-cut label. I track sellers' quality, pricing and sales over an entire season and collect household panel purchasing data to examine the demand side's response. I find that laser branding induced sellers to provide higher quality and led to higher sales profits, establishing that reputational incentives are present and can be made to pay. However, after the intervention was withdrawn, all markets reverted back to baseline. To rationalize the experimental findings, I build an empirical model of consumer learning and seller reputation. The results indicate that information frictions and fragmented markets lead to significant under-provision of quality in this setting. Though there is a high demand for quality, trust could take a long time to establish under the existing branding technology, which makes reputation building a low return investment. While the new branding technology enhances consumer learning, small individual sellers do not have the incentive to invest in this technology due to their small market size and market competition. The second chapter (co-authored with Seema Jayachandran, Edmund J. Malesky and Benjamin Olken) considers how local governments' bribe extraction could interact with firms' growth. We propose a model in which government officials' choice of how much bribe money to extract from firms is modulated by inter-jurisdictional competition. The model predicts that economic growth decreases the rate of bribe extraction under plausible assumptions, with the benefit to officials of demanding a given share of revenue as bribes outweighed by the increased risk that firms will move elsewhere. A second prediction is that the negative effect of growth on bribery is larger if firms are more mobile. We find empirical support for these predictions. In particular, we employ two instrumental variables strategies-one based on growth in a firm's industry in other provinces within Vietnam and another based on industry growth in neighboring China and find that growth causes a decrease in bribe extraction. Our results suggest that as poor countries grow, corruption could subside on "its own." Consistent with the model's predictions, we find that the effect is for firms whose property rights to their land are transferable and who have operations in multiple provinces, two proxies for geographic mobility. The third chapter examines the impact of internal trade barriers on firms' performance and export activities. It is well known that various forms of non-tariff barriers exist among Chinese provinces. However, empirically, it is difficult to measure these barriers because they can take many forms. I take advantage of an export VAT rebate policy reform in 2004 as a natural experiment to identify the existence of internal trade barriers and study the impact on TFP and resource allocation. In particular, as a result of shifting tax rebate burdens, the 2004 reform leads to a greater incentive for the provincial governments to block the domestic flow of non-local goods related to exporting. I find that foreign trade companies in the coastal region become more "inward-looking" in the years after the reform, consistent with rising local trade barriers. The value of exports through intermediaries grows less in the inland region relative to the coastal region, and the negative effect is larger in inland provinces with greater exposure to the reform, measured using baseline reliance on trade through intermediaries. I extend the standard open-economy heterogeneous firm model by adding an intermediary sector as in Ahn, Khandelwal and Wei (2011) but with a new focus on the intermediary's role of domestic sourcing. The model can be used to analyze general equilibrium effects, examine firms' entry and exit into exporting, and quantify the distortion on TFP.
by Jie Bai.
Ph. D.

The efficient operation and expansion of utilities in developing countries is crucial for growth and poverty reduction. However, recent reforms aimed at improving the performance of these sectors through privatization and the introduction of new regulatory regimes have had limited success. This thesis aims to consider the most pertinent problems for utility regulation in developing countries and how policy may need to be adapted appropriately. The thesis begins by surveying the most recent empirical and theoretical work on the area. I argue that four key institutional limitations commonly found in developing countries must be considered when designing regulatory policy: Limited capacity, limited accountability, limited commitment and limited fiscal efficiency. The remainder of the thesis then focuses on two of these weaknesses – limited commitment and limited accountability – to develop further insights into how regulatory policy may be most suitably adapted. In considering the effect of limited commitment, I pursue a theoretical approach. I first focus on the relationship between the government and the utility operator when the government cannot commit to a time-inconsistent policy of not expropriating investment. After building a model where reputation is used to sustain investment in equilibrium, I consider the model’s implications for policy. The thesis then builds a different model to consider the impact of governments’ inability to commit when trading electricity internationally. I focus on the resulting hold-up problem and the impact this has on investment levels within trading countries. The effect of limited accountability is then investigated empirically through the analysis of data on electricity firms and regulators in Latin America. In particular, I consider how firms’ performance is affected by corruption, ownership and regulatory governance, looking in detail at interactions between these variables and attempting to break down regulatory governance into its various components.

Tesis para optar al grado de Magíster en Análisis Económico
Using the Climate Investment Survey from the World Bank, we find a negative relationship between competition and innovation in developing countries. This result supports the idea of Schumpeter (1942) that competition can harm innovation. We deal with endogeneity issues using as instrument the interaction between industry turnover and entry regulation in the U.S. The basic idea is that entry regulations have a more pronounced and negative effect on competition in those industries with more natural entry. For this, we find that relevant competition is at the country-level rather than at country-industry level. Finally, we find no evidence of heterogeneity on this relationship across firms and industries.

Trois ans après l’adoption des Objectifs de Développement Durable pour une éducation primaire et secondaire universelle à l’horizon 2030, les progrès en matière de décrochage scolaire restent insuffisants. Pour tenter de répondre à ce défi majeur, cette thèse explore comment les familles investissent stratégiquement dans l’éducation de leurs enfants, selon le genre. Le chapitre 1 introduit les principaux déterminants du capital humain et examine en particulier la relation entre les droits économiques des femmes et l’éducation des enfants dans plusieurs pays en développement. Le deuxième chapitre revisite le lien entre chocs de revenu et éducation en prenant en compte le rôle de la composition des frères et soeurs dans une région rurale de Tanzanie. L’étude montre que le choc négatif affecte davantage les enfants ayant relativement plus de (jeunes) soeurs que de (jeunes) frères. Enfin, les parents peuvent décider de sous-investir dans l’éducation de leurs enfants, notamment des filles, s’ils anticipent qu’ils ne toucheront pas les fruits de leur investissement. Ainsi, le dernier chapitre évalue de façon théorique et empirique les échanges intergénérationnels entre parents-enfants en Indonésie. Nous trouvons qu’une partie des gains d’une hausse du niveau d’éducation à la fois pour les filles et les garçons, générée par une réforme de l’éducation primaire en Indonésie, est partagée avec la génération des parents. L’éducation affecte positivement les transferts envoyés aux parents à travers davantage de bénéfices à la fois sur le marché du travail et sur le marché du mariage
In the past decade, millions of children around the world have gained access to educational opportunities. However, three years after the adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals of universal primary and secondary education by 2030, there has been no progress in reducing the global number of out-of-school children. To address this issue, this thesis explores how families strategically invest in their offsprings’ education, by gender. Chapter 1 introduces the broad determinants of children’s human capital with a focus on family backgrounds such as mothers’ endowments. The study explores the relationship between women’s economic rights and children’s education in developing countries. Implicit in many researches on education is the existence of interactions between family members. Accordingly, the second chapter revisits the link between income shocks and educational achievement by considering the role of sibling composition in a rural region of Tanzania. Children suffer an additional penalty during income shocks the larger the share of girls among (younger) siblings. Finally, families might decide to underinvest in children’s education, mostly in their daughters, if they expect that they will not be able to obtain the returns for this education. Thus, the last chapter assesses theoretically and empirically the intergenerational parent-child exchange in Indonesia. We find that a substantial fraction of human capital gains for both girls and boys, generated by exposure to an educational reform, is shared with the parental generation. We show that education positively affects old-age transfers through additional labor and marital market returns for both men and women

Cette thèse en quatre parties aborde différents aspects de la décentralisation dans les pays en développement. Après avoir introduit notre travail et passé en revue la littérature sur ce thème(chapitre 1), nous nous attachons à étudier l'existence et la nature des interactions horizontales entre les gouvernements locaux dans un contexte de faibles ressources budgétaires et d'absence de démocratie locale (respectivement, chapitres 2 et 3). Nous analysons ensuite les relations verticales entre le gouvernement central et les gouvernements locaux, plus précisément, les effets et les déterminants de l’allocation des transferts intergouvernementaux (respectivement,chapitres 4 et 5). Enfin, nous déterminons l’impact final de la décentralisation sur l’accès des populations locales aux services de base (chapitre 6)
To improve the efficiency of the public sector, a decentralization process has been engaged in a large number of developing countries. This thesis, in four parts, analyzes various aspects of decentralization in developing countries. Part 1, which consists in a review of literature, studies the expected theoretical effects of decentralization, examines their relevance in the particular context of developing countries and, draws up a critical assessment of empirical studies evaluating the existence of such effects (chapter 1). Part 2 focuses on the relevance of an essential argument in favor of decentralization, largely ignored in studies on developing countries: the "competition principle". More precisely, we analyze the existence of strategic interactions between local governments in a context of weak fiscal resources (case of Benin, chapter 2) and in the absence of local democracy (case of China, chapter 3). Part 3 relates to the vertical relationship between the central government and local governments. In particular, we focus on the effect of central fiscal transfers on the level of local own-Revenue in Benin (chapter 4) and on the determinants of the allocation of fiscal transfers between local governments in Senegal (chapter 5). Finally, in part 4, we determine the average and distributional impacts of decentralization on the access to basic services by local population (chapter 6)

Cette thèse étudie le rôle des institutions dans la compréhension du processus de déforestation dans les pays en développement. L'approche retenue est celle de la nouvelle économie institutionnelle qui définit les institutions comme le cadre incitatif d'une économie, qui structure les interactions économiques des individus. Le cadre institutionnel est donc un élément à part entière du système économique, qui agit sur l'environnement humain à travers la modulation des incitations des agents. A ce titre, les institutions jouent donc un rôle majeur dans le processus de conservation ou de conversion des forêts. L'analyse de ce rôle est la problématique centrale de cette thèse et s'articule autour de trois grandes parties: (1) le rôle de la persistance des institutions ou rôle de l'histoire dans la compréhension de celui des institutions, (2) le rôle de la demande de bonne gouvernance, et (3) le rôle des institutions comme élément catalytique conditionnant l'effet de causes plus directes de la déforestation. La première partie conclut sur le rôle majeur de la prise en compte des legs légaux et coloniaux pour expliquer l' effet des institutions sur la déforestation. La seconde partie explique le rôle majeur de la demande de bonne gouvernance pour préserver la forêt, en étant un substitut (complément) d'une mauvaise (bonne) offre de bonne gouvernance. Enfin, la troisième partie de la thèse suggère de comprendre les institutions comme un facteur catalytique de la déforestation qui permet de comprendre l' effet des causes directes de celle-Ci telles que la productivité agricole des fermes de l'Amazonie Légale, ou les comportements stratégiques entre communes du Paraná dans la création de parcs municipaux
This thesis investigates the role of institutions on deforestation within the framework of the New Institutional Economics. This theory states that institutions can be defined such as the incentive systm wich shape economic interactions throughout the modulations of the incentives of agents. This way, institutions are at stake in the process of deforestation and the analysis of this role is the core of this thesis, articulated around three parts : the role of institutional persistence (1), the importance of the deman for good governance (2) and the implications of institutions and governance system as an underlying framework shaping proximate causes of deforestation (3). The first part stresses the importance of taking into account colonial and legal legacies to understand the role of institutions on deforestation. The second part explains the leading role of the demand for good governance. the third part proposes two micro-Economics applications in Brazil. The role of institutions and governance systmem on forest cover is defined as a catalytic role precipitating the effect of proximate causes on deforestation such as agricultural productivity in the Legal Amazon, or strategic behaviors between counties in the creation of municipal conservation units in the state of Paranà

The dissertation comprises of three self-contained papers. The common theme of all the papers is to estimate and examine the broader issues of rural poverty and vulnerability in developing countries. A variety of micro-econometric techniques were used depending on the context and objectives of the papers. The first paper estimates ex ante poverty and vulnerability of households in Bangladesh using Household Income and Expenditure Survey (HIES) data 2005. We use a simple two-level random intercept model to estimate consumption variance due to idiosyncratic and covariate shocks. Our results show that poverty is not same as vulnerability as a substantial share of those currently above the poverty line is highly vulnerable to poverty in the future. The study finds that those without education or agricultural households are likely to be the most vulnerable. The geographical diversity of vulnerability is considerable. It is suggested that ex ante measures to prevent households from becoming poor as well as ex post measures to alleviate those already in poverty should be combined. The second paper examines whether microfinance reduces poverty in Bangladesh drawing upon 4 rounds of household panel data covering the period 1997 to 2005. We estimate the effects of general microfinance loans as well as loans for productive purposes on three different welfare measures- household income, food consumption and women’s Body Mass Index (BMI) employing a number of methods including DID-PSM and Household Fixed Effects Model. The results of Propensity Score Matching (PSM) applied for each round show mostly positive effects of MFI’s general and productive loans on income and food consumption before 2000, but these turned negative in 2004, whilst the results of DID-PSM confirm a positive impact of MFI’s general loans on food consumption’s growth in 1999-2004. It has been found by household fixed-effects model that overall effects of MFI’s loans on income and food consumption in 1997-2004 were positive and that the purpose of the loan is important in predicting which welfare indicator is improved. Finally, the third one explores the key causal factors behind agricultural supply response and farmers' market participation decisions in Cambodia. A stylized farm household model with market imperfections is considered and a two-step decision making process is outlined. Farmers decide, first, whether or not to participate in the market and then they decide how much to sell. The model is estimated using a Heckman type regression approach. We compute the marginal effects for the full sample as well as for small and large holders. Non-price factors such as risk, technology and rural infrastructure come out as important determinants of commercialization of agriculture in Cambodia. The marginal effects for the small and large holders differ substantially both in quantitative and qualitative terms. This suggests differential treatment in terms of intervention and incentives for small and large holders would be more effective to promote market access.

Abstract The purpose of the thesis has been to investigate the relation between human capital and economic growth in developing countries around the world. The main research question is how the human capital impact on the economic growth in developing countries during the period of 2010 -2015.The world is mainly divided into two major groups, which are Developed & Developing countries, as well as poor & rich countries. In this thesis mainly concern only developing and poor countries and their role of the economic growth. The key factors of economic growth are GDP/capita, per capita income, birth rate, death rate, population growth rate, life expectancy at birth, working age population, education, literacy rate and investment in technology. The world is populated day by day such has never been before. In the past history it look back to 123 years to increased from one billion to two billion from 1804 to 1927.Then, next billion took 33 years. The following two billions took 14 years and 13 years, respectively (Ray, Development Economics).             The data has been taken from the Developing countries around the world which is taken a cross sectional data set and data has been analysed with multiple liner regressions model with ordinary least squares (OLS). For this purpose which applied the difference tools & theory which are human capital and technology development, economic growth, norms, externalities and human social capital.   The previous studies is examined the most important factors of economic development that is economic growth and human capital investment. Similarly, the theoretical discussion is described the Solow model, human capital theory, technological progress, demographic transition and social capital. For examine the data is divided into two groups which are dependent and independent variables. Economic growth GDP/capita, GDP/capita growth rate are dependent variable and Ln. GDP initial, life expectancy at birth, population growth rate, education, working age population and investment in technology are independent variables.   This analysis shows the majority of the variables in the study have positive significant relation to the GDP/capita growth. This result furthermore support the developing countries provides insight on the world economic development status towards the independents variables.

Research (e.g., Strike, Gao, & Bansal, 2006) has pointed out that international firms diversifying geographically can be both socially responsible and socially irresponsible. However, the research has failed to provide a strong theoretical explanation based on a major theory. I propose to address this gap by testing two competing perspectives based on institutional theory, i.e., the institutional-transfer approach and the institutional-void approach. Based on relevant literature, I propose a contingency model predicting the different effects of geographic diversification (GD) on corporate social performance (CSP) by focusing on the institutional differences between developed and developing countries. Moreover, arguing that the institutional approaches should also consider the effects of internal firm resources, I also predict the moderating effects of firm slack resources (the slack) on the relationship between the diversification and CSP. Adopting the approach that considers the slack in a continuum of managerial discretion, i.e., low- and high-discretion slack resources (George, 2005), I argue that high-discretion slack can strengthen the relationship between GD and CSP while low-discretion slack can weaken this relationship. To test the above hypotheses, I analyze the data of multinational enterprises (MNEs) listed on the New York Stock Exchange from 2000 to 2015. The whole sample contains 477 MNEs or 1,560 firm/year observations. Through analyzing empirical data, I have obtained evidence that there is a positive relationship between GD and corporate social responsibility (CSR) when MNEs diversify into developed countries. On the other hand, the results show a negative relationship between GD and CSR and a positive relationship between GD and corporate social irresponsibility (CSIR) when MNEs diversify into developing countries. Moreover, low-discretion slack can weaken the relationship between GD and CSR in developing countries. Theoretically, this thesis makes four contributions to the literature. First, it contributes to the GD literature by focusing on CSP. Second, it enriches institutional theory by testing the predictive validity of its two approaches (i.e., institutional-transfer approach and institutional-void approach) on the GD-CSP relationship. Third, it enriches the understanding of CSP research. Finally, it reveals that different types of slack resources could affect the GD-CSP relationship. In addition to the theoretical contributions, this thesis provides findings with practical implications for managers, governments, and stakeholders. First, managers should be aware of the institutional environments where their firms diversify. Second, managers should maintain an appropriate utility to different kinds of slack resources in their firms. Third, the government should reinforce its supervision on MNEs' diversification strategies, especially in developing countries. Fourth, stakeholders should stay alert that MNEs from developed countries can also perform CSIR behaviors.

Submitted by Joao Mendes (joao_mendes14@msn.com) on 2015-10-19T11:06:10Z No. of bitstreams: 1 JMendes_Thesis FGV(14Aug2015).pdf: 1007852 bytes, checksum: b388f2d8462fe2b91d4eed87ab68fbd5 (MD5)
Rejected by Ana Luiza Holme (ana.holme@fgv.br), reason: Prezado João, Segundo as normas da ABNT o titulo do trabalho não aparece em todas as paginas do trabalho somente na capa, lombada e folha de aprovação. Tirar também das paginas acima mencionadas a palavra "Title". Tirar também seu nome do rodapé do trabalho. Faltou a introdução. A numeração das paginas não pode ser em numeral romano e deve aparecer a partir da introdução, sendo contada a partir da capa. o agradecimento é antes do resumo. Ana Luiza Holme 3799-3492 on 2015-10-19T12:16:52Z (GMT)
Submitted by Joao Mendes (joao_mendes14@msn.com) on 2015-10-19T15:49:46Z No. of bitstreams: 1 JMendes_Thesis FGV(19OUT2015).pdf: 965643 bytes, checksum: f2221c6075ea24b3c800c2f507e8435a (MD5)
Approved for entry into archive by Ana Luiza Holme (ana.holme@fgv.br) on 2015-10-19T15:59:13Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 JMendes_Thesis FGV(19OUT2015).pdf: 965643 bytes, checksum: f2221c6075ea24b3c800c2f507e8435a (MD5)
Made available in DSpace on 2015-10-19T16:03:45Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 JMendes_Thesis FGV(19OUT2015).pdf: 965643 bytes, checksum: f2221c6075ea24b3c800c2f507e8435a (MD5) Previous issue date: 2015-09-24
Este trabalho estuda se existe impacto na volatilidade dos mercados de ações em torno das eleições nacionais nos países da OCDE e nos países em Desenvolvimento. Ao mesmo tempo, pretende, através de variáveis explicativas, descobrir os fatores responsáveis por esse impacto. Foi descoberta evidência que o impacto das eleições na volatilidade dos mercados de ações é maior nos países em Desenvolvimento. Enquanto as eleições antecipadas, a mudança na orientação política e o tamanho da população foram os factores que explicaram o aumento da volatilidade nos países da OCDE, o nível democrático, número de partidos da coligação governamental e a idade dos mercados foram os factores explicativos para os países em Desenvolvimento.
This project studies whether there is impact in stock market volatility around national elections in OECD countries and Developing countries. At the same time, it pretends, through a set of explanatory variables, find the factors that are responsible for that impact. It was found evidence that the impact of elections in stock market volatility is bigger in Developing countries. While early elections, the change in political orientation and the size of population were the factors that explained the abnormal volatility in OECD countries, the level of democracy, the number of parties of the governmental coalition and the age of the stock markets were the ones for Developing countries.

Thesis (Ph.D.) -- University of Maryland, College Park, 2009.
Thesis research directed by: Dept. of Economics. Title from t.p. of PDF. Includes bibliographical references. Published by UMI Dissertation Services, Ann Arbor, Mich. Also available in paper.