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Publications (45)
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– Evolving trends during the transition to a low carbon future
The first objective of this paper is to update earlier assessments of mineral dependence in lower-income countries. In 2018, the mining of metals and coal continued to be an important contributor to the economies of several low- and middle-income countries. As in our previous calculations of the...
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– Country priorities, fuel types, and energy decisions
This paper provides an overview of the energy transition in Asia. It sets out the underlying drivers and how these set energy transition priorities in China, India, and South East Asia. It particularly describes the role of (liquefied) natural gas in the growing energy demand and changing energy mix...
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– A data-driven approach
Robust forecasting of mining sector revenues is key to effective budgeting (and broader fiscal management) in many resource-rich countries.However, this is challenging in practice, given commodity market volatility, the extended lags (and often opaque processes) between resource discoveries and...
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– Are impact evaluation and impact evaluation synthesis contributing to evidence generation and use in low- and middle-income countries?
In 2006 the Center for Global Development’s report ‘When Will We Ever Learn? Improving lives through impact evaluation’ bemoaned the lack of rigorous impact evaluations. The authors of the present paper researched international organizations and countries including Mexico, Colombia, South Africa...
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– Ten main messages
Countries face both challenges and opportunities in using their extractive industries to achieve more inclusive development—particularly in the developing world. Yet while a large national income can result from resource wealth, it can also be associated with acute social inequality and deep poverty...
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The extractives industries must adjust their operations to shifting patterns of demand for oil, natural gas, and coal together with metals and minerals – as policies and new technologies encourage progress along low-carbon pathways in energy, transportation and construction to combat climate change...
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– Lessons from international experience for Mozambique
In common with several other low-income African economies, in recent years Mozambique has seen a significant expansion of interest and investment in its long-established extractives industries. Huge new gas finds in particular have led to expectations that these industries will contribute very...
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In 2008, the Government of Zambia reformed its mining tax regime for large-scale copper mines through a unilateral legislative change. The country went from having one of the lowest average effective tax rates and government take to be above the average. We focus on a particularly controversial...
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The governance of natural resource wealth is widely considered to constitute a key determinant in whether the extraction of natural resources proves to be a blessing or a curse. What is meant by governance can span a wide range of components, while the steps to achieving good governance remain...
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– The recent Ghanaian experience
This paper analyses the evolution of fiscal and monetary variables in Ghana, from the discovery of oil in 2007 through to 2014. It documents the deterioration of fiscal and monetary discipline over this period, which resulted in a rebound of debt, a deterioration of the external balance, and a...
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– Some practical observations from Ghana
At the heart of an effective extractive resource-based economic transformation and development is an effective regulatory framework that guides the promotion of investments into the sector, the procedure for responsible extraction, and the management of the utilization of such resources. Ghana’s...
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– Structural change or just big numbers?
This paper extends UNU-WIDER Working Paper 2016/79, which examined the economic situation in Tanzania during the resurgence of gold and diamond production after 1999, with the situation that emerged as the country began to exploit its very large resources of natural gas mainly from the Indian Ocean...
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Energy subsidy reform is critical to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals and tackling climate change. This paper sets out the evidence on the scale of subsidies and their impact. It then reviews the actions of donors in encouraging and supporting energy subsidy reforms. I find that, outside...
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Natural resources extraction inevitably imposes environmental injuries including diversion of scarce water away from pressing local needs, disruption of fragile ecosystems, and longer-range and often irreparable harm. These fall most forcefully on the local populations at or near the extraction...
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Industrial policy is back. Advocates for industrial policy argue that the important question is not whether such policies should be applied at all, but how to design and implement them. For the extractive industries this development poses a challenge. First, there is the argument that host countries...
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– New African oil, gas, and mining economies
This paper examines a broad range of opportunities for addressing the pressing human development needs of low-income countries by using new oil, gas, and mineral discoveries. It assesses how much of an impact can be made on the funding gaps for health and education by new oil and gas revenues, and...
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In several low- and middle-income countries with important extractive sectors, gross national income has developed favourably. Africa has benefitted most, particularly West Africa. This survey provides an up-to-date statistical analysis of the contribution of non-fuel minerals mining to low- and...
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– From an ‘all of government’ approach to Partnerships for Development
This paper outlines how sustainable development in resource-rich countries requires an ‘all of government’ approach as well as multi-stakeholder dialogue and partnerships between government, companies, and civil society organizations. Effective management and regulation requires many different line...
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– The possibilities and the realities
The paper discusses the practical possibilities of achieving increased downstream processing and the policies that are commonly used for this purpose. It reviews the reasons why forward vertical integration is not always an optimal choice for extractive industry companies. It finds little support...
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– Brazil and the Vale SA model of corporate interaction
Reflection about the role of corporate social investment in Brazil, associated with the presence of a large economic enterprise, is the major stimulus of this paper. It seeks to present how cross-sector governance can contribute to the social development of a city and how this process can be led by...
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A large mining project has the potential to be a partner in assisting local communities in their development efforts. Communities located in close proximity to a large mine have every right to expect that the project will benefit their community. Often, reality falls short of their expectations and...
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– The statistical tendencies
This paper synthesizes statistical information evidencing the proposition that extractive industries are of great significance in many low- and middle-income developing economies. It examines the scale of the current dependence of low- and middle-income economies on both types of extractive...
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Local content policies in the context of extractive industries have attracted increased interest in recent years. Most countries with a significant extractive industry have included local content requirements either in their legislation or exploitation contracts. Such efforts may be constrained by...
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– National oil companies as instruments of risk and reward
National oil companies tend to elicit unequivocal views. To political leaders within petroleum-producing countries, they often represent a sine qua non of a strategy capable of delivering long-term benefits to citizens. To many international analysts and donors, they represent vestiges of an...
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– The channels for indirect impacts
This paper discusses the channels of impact of an extractives activity on an economy by presenting a brief description supported by graphics of the different routes through which the direct economic and social impacts of these activities might be enhanced. These routes include those that often have...
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– Mining
The taxation of the mining industry varies considerably from nation to nation. This paper reflects on the evolving use of various taxation approaches applied by governments to the mining sector. It includes a description of the principal tax types and investment tax incentives and briefly describes...
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– Scope and limits
Historically, Chile has been an economy dominated by mineral and agro-industrial products and subject to frequent external shocks particularly in copper prices. Since the 1980s, the authorities have developed various mechanisms to cope with these shocks and dampen their effects on the domestic...
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In recognizing that women’s participation and gender equity is a precondition for the achievement of acceptable development outcomes, extractives industry companies are increasingly making public commitments to integrating gender equality, inclusion, and women’s economic empowerment into aspects of...
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– Opportunities and obstacles for civil society
Civil society organizations have played various roles in promoting the capture of benefits from and protection against the negative impacts of extractive industries. Payment disclosure is one potentially powerful tool for such organizations to promote greater local benefit capture. Practitioners and...
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– Short- versus long-term considerations
The prescription of optimally managing natural resource revenue windfalls by smoothing consumption across generations using an intergenerational sovereign wealth fund that only invests in foreign assets is not appropriate for resource-rich developing economies. It is better for these economies to...
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– The view from Zambia
Mining is the largest sector of the Zambian economy but, as has been the case elsewhere, the relationship between mining companies and their host communities has been fractious, without a clear path towards sustainability. The severe social, economic, and environmental impacts of mining have been...
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– Lessons from Nigeria and Ghana
Donor interest in the extractives sector is based upon the premise that it represents an opportunity to improve a country’s development prospects. However, in many cases the presence of extractive resources is associated with poor economic performance. As a result, some donors are trying a radically...
Displaying 32 of 45 results