Modern trade theory suggests that protectionist policies hinder exports by altering domestic prices and production incentives. This paper examines the effect of import tariffs on Mexican non-oil exports through a comprehensive analysis of the Mexican trade sector, including a breakdown of the most important free trade agreements for the Mexican economy, information on Mexican resource mobility and factor endowment, and analysis on Mexico’s tariff structure. The paper finds that import tariffs on both intermediate and final goods have a direct and significant effect on exports, alluding to the existence of an anti-export bias, and argues that free trade is the most effective way to promote exports and allow for domestic price readjustment.

Liberalization of the Indian economy in 199I increased the intensity of international competition and changed the internal information needs of Indian managers. This paper explores the evolution of a broad range of management accounting practices in 14 firms using a contingency theory framework. Differences in management accounting practices in 1996 are examined in relation to firms' experience and exposure to world markets prior to liberalization and as a function of contemporaneous differences in competitive strategy. We find evidence of changes associated with shifts in the external environment. / University of Michigan Business School

Liberalization has been, for the past three decades, one of the most prominent strategies used in the developing world to promote growth and foster development. Haiti, as many other least developed countries, has implemented the liberalization policies over the past two decades. The poor socioeconomic conditions of the Haitians, today, have pushed to question the effectiveness of the neoliberal plan. Agriculture being a pivotal sector of the Haitian economy, the study goal is the evaluation of liberalization on the agricultural production. The findings are that trade liberalization is detrimental to agriculture in Haiti. The food crops production, a major component of the agricultural production, in terms of providing income to the rural poor and ensuring food security, suffered the most from trade liberalization. Also, cash crops production has not increased with liberalization.

This dissertation investigates the role of public support for R&D in product innovation. In particular, I consider the role of matching grant programs and develop a theoretical model to analyze optimal private and public choices in a game-theoretic framework. This research develops-theoretical models to examine welfare implications of various policies that promote R&D. The first chapter of my dissertation develops a theoretical model of product innovation where R&D effort is endogenous and its outcome uncertain. The government attempts to aid such efforts with a matching grant. I consider different scenarios depending on whether two parties act simultaneously, act sequentially, or take part in a dynamic cooperative game with a trigger strategy. I also consider the case when the products are exported and when they are not. I analyze situations when government intervention increases the chances of product innovation and when it does not. The second chapter introduces foreign competition in a goods market, and analyzes the effects of foreign competition on domestic private and public incentives to product innovate. Government uses matching grant programs to aid private attempts to develop new goods. The government also tries to protect the domestic firm by imposing import tariff. Two policies are then considered simultaneously to investigate the effect of trade liberalization on product innovation. The third chapter considers technological partnerships between private and public sectors as R&D promoting policy. I assume increasing returns in R&D, and study whether government should support product innovation by helping with fixed costs or variable costs associated with product R&D.

Since their inception in African countries, structural adjustment has tended to cause more harm than help. This thesis aims to answer the question, in what ways have structural adjustment policies impacted Africa in general and Sierra Leone in particular? This question is highly relevant when it is considered that Africa is one of the poorest regions in the world and has experiences much conflict and suffering. In addition, much is known about the impact of structural adjustment in many African countries. However, little has been written on the impact of structural adjustment in Sierra Leone, especially in terms of the impact of structural adjustment on conflict. The hypothesis of this thesis is that the impact of structural adjustment policies has tended to increase poverty. Poverty has led to frustration and conflict in Africa in general and Sierra Leone in particular. In order to substantiate this hypothesis I have elected to focus on the years between 1960 and the late 1980s. The finding contained within this thesis show that structural adjustment policies may have led to a reduction of social services that include health, education and unemployment.

La relation entre le développement financier et la croissance économique a suscité une attention particulière dans la littérature économique durant ces dernières décennies. Notre recherche tente d’apprécier les effets du processus de libéralisation du système financier au Maroc sur la croissance économique. Les résultats obtenus montrent la nécessité de mettre en place des mécanismes permettant d’optimiser les répercussions positives de la libéralisation financière sur l’économie réelle. Ainsi définie, la libéralisation financière est perçue dans certains pays développés au cours de la décennie 70, tantôt comme une stratégie idéologiquement élaborée par les autorités concernées, tantôt comme une contrainte imposée par le marché. Son évolution ne s’est étendue à la quasi-totalité des pays en développement que durant la décennie 80, avec l’institution des Programmes d’Ajustement Structurel et le déclenchement du processus de mondialisation. Conscient du rôle majeur que peut jouer le secteur financier dans la dynamisation de l’activité économique nationale, les autorités marocaines ont lancé depuis le début des années 90 un processus continu et ininterrompu de réformes à travers notamment la levée des contraintes qui pesaient sur le système bancaire marocain, sur le développement du marché des capitaux et sur la libéralisation du mode de financement du Trésor. La finalité étant de développer la physionomie du secteur financier, pour en faire un instrument efficient de mobilisation de l’épargne, et de sa canalisation vers le financement de l’investissement d’une croissance durable, génératrice de richesse et réductrice de de chômage et de pauvreté. / The relationship between financial development and economic growth has attracted particular attention in the economic literature in recent decades. Our research tries to assess the effects of liberalization of the financial system in Morocco on economic growth. The results show the need to put in place mechanisms to optimize and strengthen the positive impact of financial liberalization on the real economy. Thus defined, financial liberalization is seen in some developed countries during the 70s, sometimes ideologically as a strategy developed by the authorities concerned, sometimes as a constraint imposed by the market. Its evolution has intensified and spread to almost all developing countries during the 80s, with the institution of Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAP) and the outbreak of the globalization process. Recognizing the important role that the financial sector can play in boosting national economic activity, the Moroccan authorities have launched, since the early 90s, a continuous and uninterrupted process of reform, in particular through the lifting of constraints on the Moroccan bank system, on the development of capital market liberalization and the way to finance the Treasury. The aim is to develop and improve the face of the financial sector to make it an efficient instrument of mobilization and development of savings and its channeling towards the financing of investment for strong, sustainable growth, generating wealth and reducing unemployment and poverty.

Access to adequate and nutritionally balanced food to achieve a productive and healthy life for all individuals, on a daily basis, has been an elusive challenge in several parts of the world. In many developing countries such as Botswana, increasing per capita food consumption has been hampered by poverty as well as poor access to marketable skills and employment opportunities. Experience and studies elsewhere indicate that international trade liberalization based on comparative cost advantage in the goods sectors, can greatly improve per capita food consumption through improved export market access and reduction in tariffs. The purpose of this study is to analyze the effects of international trade liberalization on food security/household welfare and the competitiveness of the agricultural sector in Botswana. In undertaking this study basically two hypotheses were made. Firstly, it is hypothesized that trade liberalization within SACU through the reduction of agricultural tariffs on food commodities can improve per capita consumption by reducing domestic food prices. Currently, products like maize grain, beef, dairy and wheat grain attract an import duty which partly increases their domestic prices within SACU. Poor households in Botswana, in particular, spend a disproportionate share of their disposable income on food most of which is imported. Secondly, this study also hypothesizes that improved market access of agricultural exports for Botswana based on WTO rules could generate additional foreign earnings that could be used to import more food. Globally, agricultural trade is characterized by distortions that restrict free commerce based on comparative advantage. Direct producer price and input subsidies together with export subsidies to farmers especially in major trade players like the EU, USA and Japan constitute barriers to trade and disadvantage developing countries like Botswana which have comparative advantage in several farm commodities. Subsidies by major industrialized countries create an artificial comparative advantage for their farmers as without direct farmer assistance, it is doubtful if some of them could invest in agriculture! Secondary data on international trade and social accounting matrix (SAM) were used in this study. Trade data were used to conduct policy simulations in order to determine the effects of trade liberalization on food security and competitiveness of the agricultural sector in Botswana. SAM data for 1993/94 were modified and used to generate income and price multipliers to undertake policy simulations. Data from SAM captures the income and demand linkages in the economy. Using partial equilibrium and economy-wide approach (SAM multiplier analysis), this study shows that Botswana can improve its household welfare or per capita food consumption through an increase in export earnings which in turn could be used to import more food at competitive prices. Except for meat products especially beef, Botswana is a net-importer of most food items. Based on a partial equilibrium agricultural trade policy model, this study found that the country’s agricultural sector enjoys global comparative advantage in beef exports if there was global trade liberalization. The model advocates for the reduction of direct producer price, input and export subsidies in the agricultural sector by WTO members. Beef earnings including those from other goods like textiles and minerals are used to purchase imported food to increase domestic supply. Through a SAM income multiplier analysis, policy simulations on improved export market access for beef and textiles indicated that households, factors and activities gained from global trade liberalization. However, poor households without assets or factors such as capital and skills marginally benefited from improved export market access. This finding also indicates the potential negative income distributional effects which require policy support to benefit poor households during trade liberalization. Beef and textiles exports were chosen when undertaking policy simulations based on improved market access. With a SAM price multiplier analysis, policy simulations based on SACU tariff reduction on maize grain, beef, powdered milk and wheat grain was made. Applied tariffs were used for policy simulations. A reduction in tariffs not only improves household welfare, factors and activities also benefit through lower domestic food costs/prices. This study found that SACU tariff reduction indeed contributed to welfare improvements among households in Botswana as their cost of living declined. Poor households, in particular, benefited most from tariff reduction in imported food commodities. Factors including low-wage workers also gained from a reduction of import duties on selected food commodities. However, government loses tariff revenue when import duties are cut while producers of exports enjoying preferential markets such as the beef producers in Botswana lose when trade-distorting agricultural subsides are removed/reduced. Like government, consumers of imported food items are, in short term, adversely affected by an increase in food prices following the reduction of trade-distorting agricultural subsidies (producer price, input and export subsidies). The results of the SAM price multiplier analysis also indicated limited price/cost transmission in the economy following tariff reduction. Limited price transmission or circular flow of cost reduction in the economy imply weak competition in the market, poor information dissemination, institutional rigidities, etc hence the need for an effective competition policy and law. An effective competition policy and authority minimizes unfair trading practices and provides consumers and the economy with choice and possibly maximum net-value for money. In addition to improving welfare and reducing cost of living, etc, this study also found that when policy simulations/shocks were made, income and demand linkages in the economy were identified. In some simulations the linkages demonstrated a strong circular flow of income/price transmission while in others the multiplier effects were weak indicating limited economic integration/competition, a policy challenge that requires efforts for sustained diversification. Based on the results from SAM multiplier analysis, this study has provided Botswana with useful information to design policies that enhance economic integration and diversification. To maximize her benefits from international trade liberalization, Botswana also needs to implement complementary policies to address supply-side constraints and improve infrastructure, competition, information technology, etc. Safeguard mechanisms are still necessary to protect the agricultural sector and the economy in Botswana from unfair trade practices including market failure. / Thesis (PhD (Agricultural Economics))--University of Pretoria, 2007. / Agricultural Economics, Extension and Rural Development / PhD / unrestricted

Liberalization of the electronic communications is one of the most important processes in the last few years. For control of electronic communications was defined The New Regulatory Framework across all countries in the European Union. This work tries to present the impacts of mobile telecommunication regalution. This dissertation is especially focused for situation in the Czech Republic through history and classification of telecommunication services, development of legal regulations of telecommunication in 20th and 21st century and the explanation of mobile operators situation in the Czech Republic.

The thesis deals with usage of additional services as a marketing technique of utility companies after the liberalization of natural gas and electricity markets. Aim of the thesis is to design a portfolio of additional services that will provide a utility company with a loyal customer base. The portfolio is based on analysis of theoretical background as well as analysis of current supply of additional services on Czech and foreign utility markets.

A major financial sector reform program has been implemented in Ghana since the early 1980s, involving financial liberalization and institutional reforms. Financial reforms became necessary, because the pre-reform policies together with acute and prolonged economic crisis had severely damaged the financial system. In the early 1990s, the government launched financial market liberalization policies under the financial sector adjustment program to restructure the distressed banks and clean up nonperforming assets in order to restore banks to profitability and viability. The study investigated the market structure of Ghana's banking industry and determined whether the market structure has been changed after the financial restructuring. This study specifically measures the degree of competition of the banking system in Ghana by using the H-statistic. Various studies on the degree of competition were reviewed. This study employs a widely used nonstructural methodology put forward by Panzar and Rosse (1987)--the H-statistic-- and draws upon comprehensive average annual data from the various issues of the Bank of Ghana annual reports from 1988 to 2008. Maximum likelihood techniques were used to estimate the model. Based on the reported H-statistic for pre and postliberalization (2.35657 and 3.27530 respectively), it can be concluded that Ghana's banks are operating under perfect competition. However, the test for a change in competition status at the time of liberalization was not significant, indicating no evidence of a change in competition as a result of liberalization. The result of the market equilibrium reveals that the market equilibrium equals zero, revealing the existence of long-run equilibrium making the Panzar and Rosse model meaningful to interpret. The findings are consistent with the results obtained by Yuan (2006) who found Chinese banking market to be near perfect competition. This study has extended and strengthened some earlier results on bank competition in Ghana. However, the results of this study are different from the study undertaken by Buchs and Mathisen (2005), who found Ghanaian banking markets to operate under monopolistic conditions without considering the effect of liberalization. Three innovations of the current study are the use of comprehensive data source, the consideration of longer period of time covering two decades (1988-2008) and the incorporation of liberalization factors. Overall, the Panzar and Rosse model is regarded as a valuable tool for assessing the banking market conditions in Ghana. Since a bank's revenue is more likely to be observable than output prices and quantities or actual costs.