European Journal of Development Research最新文献

Improving policies-broadly defined-is at the heart of the structural transformation agenda. This paper describes the use of a new evaluation method-outcome trajectory evaluation (OTE), based on both evaluation and policy process theory-to explore the influence of HarvestPlus, a large and complex research for development program focused on improving nutrition, on a specific policy outcome, namely the establishment of biofortification crop breeding programs in national agricultural research institutes in Bangladesh, India, and Rwanda. The findings support claims of significant HarvestPlus contributions while also raising issues that need to be monitored to ensure sustainability. The paper also discusses the pros and cons of the OTE approach in terms of methodological rigor and the accumulation of learning from one evaluation to the next.

The research aims to prioritize the pandemic's impact on the financial markets of developed and developing economies using a multi-criteria decision-making approach. The results revealed that COVID-19's pandemic effects on financial markets differ between developed and developing nations. COVID-19 pandemic affects developed countries' financial markets more through supply reduction, demand reduction, and economic instability. Regarding developing nations, confidence and expectations, changes in consumption patterns, and the bandwagon effect are the three most significant impacts of COVID-19 pandemic on financial markets. The best decisions to lower the effect of COVID-19 pandemic on developed nations' financial markets are the declaration of the stimulus package and support of small-and-medium-sized enterprises. Contrastingly, in developing countries, support for vulnerable households and declaration of the stimulus package are the best decisions to combat COVID-19's negative impact on their financial markets. As practical policy implications for lowering COVID-19's negative impact on financial markets, the promotion of new financing instruments, reconstruction of the relationship between public and private sectors, and support of vulnerable households and enterprises are highly recommended.

The COVID-19 pandemic, an unprecedented global health crisis, rapidly transferred into a global economic and social crisis. The pandemic has threatened the world's commitment to achieve Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030 as governments in developing countries have shifted their priorities from attaining SDGs, to providing urgent financial needs to save lives and prevent recession in hopes for a rapid economic recovery. The rerouting of public funding priorities has undermined the progress and achievement of SDGs. We employed a mixed-method and carried out a comparative study using pre- and post-public financial data of two developing countries in South Asia; Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. A threefold analysis was conducted to investigate the evolution of the COVID-19 pandemic in two countries, the impact of the pandemic on external and internal public finance and the effect of the pandemic in shifting the policy priorities from SDGs to economic survival. This study found that both countries are highly vulnerable to the COVID-19 pandemic and are suffering from the lack of financing from external sources through the private sector as well as an increasing foreign debt. There is mounting pressure on the fiscal balance in both countries.

Supplementary information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1057/s41287-022-00558-6.

Confronted with rapidly deteriorating climate change resulting from the use of fossil fuels, the transition to renewable energy has now become imminent. But this shift to renewable energy requires massive financial support from banks, affecting their default risk. Responding to the growing environmental concerns and reluctance among banks to increase their exposure in the renewable energy sector, this study presents unique and novel insights on the relationship between the share of renewable energy in the total energy supply of a country and banking risk. To this end, we obtained data for a sample of 80 international banks from 20 countries in the 2006-2017 period. On this data, we implemented a two-stage least squares (2SLS) regression analysis model. Our findings reveal that increasing the share of renewable energy in the total energy supply of a country significantly reduces banks' default risk. To check the robustness of the results, we performed several tests which also endorsed the validity of our results.

The economic and social impact of covid-19 pandemic both on developing and developed countries has been significant. In addition to the impact of the pandemic, the current Ukraine war has also led to severe supply chain disruptions leading to a sharp increase in food and commodity prices globally. Due to a combination of external shocks and the impact of the pandemic global economic growth is expected to slow down from 6.1% in 2021 to 3.2% in 2022 and further to 2.7% in 2023 (IMF in: World economic outlook, International Monetary Fund, 2022). The above factors have led to a sharp increase in government expenditure constraining both developed and developing countries' fiscal capacity. This has further implications for the achievement of SDGs especially for low-income countries. The challenge for developing countries in the current scenario is to mobilise adequate resources both from domestic and international sources, not just for the achievement of SDGs as such, but also to sustain the livelihoods, health, and welfare of people. This special issue aims to examine some of these issues in the context of developing countries.

This research assesses the effects of COVID-19-associated shocks on financial constraints and sustainable development goal (SDG) performance to shed light on the impact of SDGs on economic recovery. We construct a large sample of Chinese listed firms from quarterly firm-level accounting data from the China Stock Market & Accounting Research Database for the period 2019Q1-2021Q1, matched with environmental, social, and governance (ESG) scores, SDG performance from the WIND Database, and complemented with data on cumulative and new cases of COVID-19 from the World Health Organization. We use difference-in-differences to investigate any causal effect from COVID-19. We find that COVID-19 induces financial constraints in firms. Further, differing from the existing literature on the determinants of SDGs, we explore the supportive role of SDG performance on firm financial performance and show that ESG can better describe SDG performance and alleviate financial constraints. Moreover, both internal and external financial intermediaries improve with enhanced ESG performance in overcoming financial constraints. Our findings strongly indicate that a sustainable development strategy facilitates efficient adaptation to financial challenges and assists in overcoming external shocks.

Focusing on the financing barriers to firm productivity improvement under the influence of external shocks, we empirically analyze the data of A-share listed companies from 2007-2018 to determine the impact of financing constraints on total factor productivity (TFP) in the context of COVID-19 pandemic and the paths of factor use efficiency and R&D innovation efficiency on this impact using ordinary least-squares (OLS) method. We find that financing constraints are an important factor inhibiting the TFP of firms. This inhibitory effect is more serious in small-scale firms, non-state firms, and non-energy firms. Further investigation shows that the inhibitory effect of financing constraints on firms' TFP is more pronounced when firms are located in the Yangtze River Delta city cluster, the Pearl River Delta city cluster, non-port cities, and provincial capitals. The mechanism test finds that improving the efficiency of capital use and labor use can alleviate the suppressive effect of financing constraints on TFP. The alleviating impact is more significant when capital use efficiency is improved. However, increasing the efficiency of R&D innovation further strengthens the inhibitory effect of financing constraints, and this effect is more pronounced under positive external shocks.

While evaluation of research-to-policy projects is a fundamental aspect of measuring the impact of new knowledge, limited studies have examined evaluation methods in such projects, as well as how the evaluation can generate learning to facilitate the progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This study conducted a systematic literature review and found that the most commonly used methods for SDG contribution evaluation were Analytical Hierarchy Process (40.4%), Fuzzy TOPSIS (13.2%) and ELECTRE and SPADE Methodology (3.5% each). Ranking analysis was undertaken to determine priorities among the six "Big Wins" as defined for the UKRI-GCRF Trade Hub Project, as a case, where the ranking was exercised by the project partners across the globe. Results revealed that "nature and social factors" was better considered in international trade agreements as the priority (36.4%) among others. Moreover, among the four "mechanisms" of the project, "knowledge, networks, and connectivity" was ranked as the top priority (56.9%), followed by "capacity building" (28.5%), "metrics, tools and models" (7.2%), and "improving the knowledge base" (4.6%). Mapping and evaluation revealed that the Big Wins of the Trade Hub contributed to ten out of the 17 SDGs. The most fulfilled goals were SDG 12 (Sustainable Consumption and Production), SDG 15 (Life on Land), and SDG 2 (Zero Hunger) in descending order. Furthermore, interaction analysis of the core SDGs revealed both synergy and tradeoff between different outputs. The research articles reviewed for this paper showed no gold standard framework for assessing international development projects against the SDGs. Further research should develop a tool to capture holistic and synergistic contributions of the target outcomes of projects to sustainable development.

COVID-19 has acutely arrested the attainment of sustainable development goals (SDGs). Internal mobilization of resources got slimmed as the government's expenditure on health and social safety nets have increased. External sources are also constricted owing to the uncertainties over the cross-border investment and economic recovery process of the countries. A government study in 2017 projected that Bangladesh, on average, would need an additional USD 68.83 billion from internal sources and USD 11.03 billion from external sources since 2021 to accomplish its SDGs by 2030. Using autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL)forecasting techniques, this paper re-estimated future flows of all SDGs funding sources, e.g., fiscal revenues, private sector investment, non-government organizations (NGOs), public-private partnerships, foreign direct investments, and foreign grant still 2030 under the purview of the COVID-19. Revised allocation estimated by this study reveals that private investment and NGOs would need to contribute higher than the 2017 estimation during 2021-2025 while only private investment needs to be higher during 2026-2030.

The Covid-19 pandemic has shocked the global energy system. It has resulted in tremendous uncertainty and diminished the recent advances to increase access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy-an objective preserved in the UN Sustainable Development Goal 7 (SDG-7). According to the IEA, attaining universal electricity access in Africa in line with SDG-7 entails annual investments of approximately $20 billion over the next decade. Given the sizeable magnitudes involved, it is inevitable that energy projects will need to rely on richer nations for energy aid. This paper explores the linkages between energy-related external aid, carbon emissions, per capita GDP, and electricity access for a sample of 30 low-income SSA countries over 1995 to 2016. Our econometric analysis reveals that while all types of energy aid facilitate economic growth in the long run, there is no direct impact of energy-related aid on electricity access. However, an increase in per capita GDP is positively associated with electricity access in both rural and urban areas. We also find that energy-related aid helps mitigate carbon emissions as well as contribute to GDP. Taken together, our results suggest that enhanced energy-related aid to low-income SSA countries can directly facilitate climate compatible growth and indirectly impel improvements in electricity access thereby helping with poverty reduction. We also advocate regional cooperation among SSA countries as a collective effort to confront shared energy challenges.