Household surveys in Guatemala, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka were analyzed using a two-stage Heckman model to examine the factors influencing the decision to use liquefied petroleum gas (stage 1) and, among users, the quantity consumed per person (stage 2). In the first...

Oil prices more than tripled between January 2004 and March 2008. The effects can be hard on countries with large net oil imports relative to income. This note sets out a measure of vulnerability to oil price shocks and breaks it down into its components. That allows cross-country benchmarking...

Many developing countries subsidize petroleum products. The doubling of world oil prices since January 2004 has had very high fiscal costs for these countries, increasing public debt and squeezing other government spending. The subsidies have also had unintended results. But phasing out...

In the fuel business, smuggling, adulteration, mislabeling, and short-weighting are widespread in many developing counties. Not only do these commercial abuses reduce consumer welfare and government excise revenue but the combustion of substandard fuels can have a serious public health impact....

The vehicle inspection program in Mexico City is regard as one of the most successful in a developing country. As the program evolved it suffered the problem common to most such scheme in developing countries -- high levels of evasion. But the program now operates well, through high volume,...

Pakistan's power sector underwent a substantial, if protracted, reform process. Beginning with an independent power producer program in 1994, the full unbundling of the national vertically integrated power and water utility, the Water and Power Development Authority, and the establishment of a...

The Philippines power sector underwent a substantial and largely complete reform process. Following a severe shortage of supply in the late 1980s and the Asian Financial crisis of 1997, which made the dollar-denominated debt of the National Power Corporation extremely burdensome, the Electric...

This paper reviews recent literature on the impacts of various components of power sector reform on the performance of electric utilities in developing countries. Recent literature is heavily focused on statistical testing of the significance of the links between four components of sector reform...

The pace of technological advance in the past few decades has opened new possibilities. Consider the technology for controlling emissions from cars, buses, and trucks. Government regulations have driven this technology as much as the technology has driven regulations, resulting in vehicle...