Key economic variables in Cote
d'Ivoire vary widely from their long-run trends, moving
in multi-year cyclical patterns. Cocoa prices move with
cycles in growth rates, capital stock, real exchange rates,
terms of trade, cocoa production, and coffee production and
output. These patterns have become more pronounced since the
1970s as volatility increased. This paper characterize these
cycles, estimates the cocoa price-quantity relationship, and

Natural and extensively used ecosystems regulate regional climate and water cycles, store carbon, and provide a range of other goods and services to human societies. Disruption of their functioning may have severe impacts on regional agriculture. Under the combined pressures of human land use and changing climate, ecosystem functioning is threatened if the rate of change exceeds natural adaptation potential. Ecosystem conserving management could concentrate on regions with a high risk of catastrophic change, if they were known.

How the production of crops and livestock products has evolved in the different regions over the past 45 years is studied. The paper focuses on how the increased supply of and demand for agricultural commodities have affected terms of agricultural trade and the sources of agricultural growth. While significant progress has been made in raising food consumption per capita (in developing countries consumption increased from an average of 2100 kcal/person/day in 1970 to almost 2700 kcal/person/day, there are still more than 850 million undernourished people worldwide.

Using data obtained from Living Standards Measurement Surveys of rural households, the socioeconomic trends in rural households is defined for a limited set of countries in the 90's and 2000's. These trends are studied in light of seven categories of rural economies: self-employed agriculture, employer agriculture (land owners), employee agriculture, self-employed not agriculture; employer not agriculture, employee not agriculture, not in the labor force. Relative differences in income, consumption and poverty are documented.

The North West Frontier Province (NWFP)
is the third largest province of Pakistan. The province is
landlocked and the land routes to the north are few and
difficult, passing through hilly terrain. The province
itself is largely mountainous, with only 30 percent
cultivated land. Nearly 50 percent of the population lives
in the mountainous and arid areas. The province shares a
long border with eastern and southern Afghanistan and most

The globalization of corporate finance also points to other challenges. As emerging-market corporations have expanded their international operations, they have increased their exposure to interest rate and currency risks. Concerns are growing that several countries in emerging Europe and Central Asia are experiencing a credit boom engendered by cross-border borrowing by banks of untested financial health and stamina. Some of these banks have increased their foreign exchange exposure to worrisome levels, a concern that warrants special attention from national policymakers.

This Sourcebook has been prepared to
help in implementing the World Bank's current rural
strategy, by sharing information on investment options and
innovative approaches that will aid the design of future
lending programs for agriculture. The Sourcebook provides
generic good practices and many examples that demonstrate
that investment in agriculture can provide rewarding and
sustainable returns to development efforts. The contents

One of the recurring themes in the sustainability literature has been the legitimacy of using an economic framework to account for natural resources. This paper examines the potential for substituting between different inputs in the generation of income, where the inputs include natural resources such as land and energy resources. A nested constant elasticity of substitution (CES) production function is used to allow flexibility in the estimated elasticities of substitution.

The authors provide estimates of the impact that removing all merchandise trade distortions (including agricultural subsidies) would have on food and agricultural production, trade, and incomes.

The question of how rural labour markets and migration can be made to work better for poverty reduction is the focus of the paper. Using select case and longitudinal studies from five parts of India and Bangladesh, the key processes that shape rural labour markets and how these have evolved over time with the changing macro-economic, policy, agro-ecological and infrastructural context are discussed.

By using long-term panel data sets of rural households in the Philippines, Thailand, Bangladesh, and India and cross-sectional data sets in Kenya, Uganda, and Ethiopia, the roles of labor markets in long-term poverty reduction in Asia is compared with the current situation in East Africa. The study finds that the reliance on agricultural labor markets alone will not reduce poverty to a significant extent, in view of the declining share of agricultural wage income in Asia and its negligibly low level in East Africa.

From what was historically known as
'Arabia Felix', a land of prosperity and
happiness, Yemen has become the most impoverished among the
Arab countries. The government of the united Yemen, formed
in 1990, has launched so far three five-year economic reform
plans with the goal of restoring Yemen's prosperity.
Have these efforts succeeded? What policies are needed to
further reduce poverty? The poverty assessment report aims