The study used a structural vector autoregressive approach to estimate and quantify the percentage decline in consumption expenditure, which can be attributed to changes in housing wealth, after monetary policy tightening. The effects are separated using a disaggregated Absa house price data,...

This paper analyses the applicability of a nonlinear Taylor rule in characterizing the monetary policy behavior of the South African Reserve Bank, using a logistic smooth transition regression approach. Using quarterly data from 1976 to 2008 to analyze the movement of the nominal short term...

Drawing on the 2007 and 2010 Swaziland Labor Force Surveys, this paper provides first systematic evidence on recent youth employment challenges in Swaziland, a small, land-locked, middle-income country with one of the highest youth unemployment rates in Africa. The paper first documents the...

The East African Community (EAC) economic integration has gained momentum recently, with the EAC countries aiming to adopt a single currency in 2015. This paper evaluates empirically the readiness of the EAC countries for monetary union. First, structural similarity of the EAC countries is...

The East African Community (EAC) economic integration has gained momentum recently, with the EAC countries aiming to adopt a single currency in 2015. This paper evaluates empirically the readiness of the EAC countries for monetary union. First, structural similarity of the EAC countries is...

Egypt, Morocco and Tunisia face challenges competing on the global markets, as shown by their relatively low and stagnant export shares. The limited export competitiveness has hampered external demand, growth and employment. Applying, for the first time to North Africa, the stock-flow approach...

The objective of this paper is to discussmacroeconomic policies that would helpAfrican countries, especially the lowincome countries (LICs), reach strong,sustained and shared growth in the postcrisisworld. The paper first reviews, witha special focus on LICs, macroeconomicpolicies in Africa...

Smallholder agriculture continues to play akey role in African agriculture. This paperinvestigates trends, challenges andopportunities of this sub-sector in EastAfrica through case studies of Kenya,Ethiopia, Uganda and Tanzania. In theseagriculture-based economies, smallholderfarming accounts...

Twenty years after the launch of market reforms, productive entrepreneurship and vibrant small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Ethiopia remain limited, the recent growth acceleration notwithstanding. This paper first develops a model of entrepreneurial start ups in an economy with...

Since mid-2000s, Ethiopia has been one of the fastest growing countries in the world. However, productive entrepreneurship in high-value added activities has made limited contributions to this growth, in part because of a weak business environment. Moreover, the low-productive firms in the...