Policy Analysis

This book is the outcome of joint work by the Secretariats of UNCTAD and the WTO. Its six chapters were written collaboratively by academics and staff of the two organizations. The volume aims to help researchers and policy-makers expand their knowledge of quantitative economic methods and data sources for trade policy analysis. The need for the book is based on the belief that good policy needs to be backed by good analysis.

When there is disconnect between research and policy, high quality research-based information can be produced without impact on policy dialogue and action. This often results in policy actions lagging far behind scientific and academic knowledge, the presence of avoidable inefficiencies in policy design and implementation, and policies that may not fulfill their purpose. While there is no real consensus on how to successfully improve linkages between research and policy, it is clear that understanding the specific context in which policy decisions take place is critical.

This paper reports on the construction and testing of a Standard International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) computable general equilibrium model for South Africa. A 1998 social accounting matrix (SAM) for South Africa is compiled using national accounts information and recently released supply-use tables. By updating to a recent year, and by distinguishing between producers and commodities, this SAM is an improvement on the existing SAM databases for South Africa.

The development of effective and sustainable economic policies for Tanzania requires access to appropriate databases. One such database is a social accounting matrix (SAM) that details the structure of the entire economy, taking into account the patterns of production and demand, and various institutional relationships.

The 1991 Social Accounting Matrix (SAM) for Zimbabwe that we document in this paper is intended to provide benchmark data for economy-wide analysis .

This paper outlines the construction of a 2003 social accounting matrix (SAM) for Kenya. A SAM is a consistent data framework that captures the information contained in the national income and product accounts and the input-output table, as well as the monetary flows between institutions. A SAM is an ex-post accounting framework since, within its square matrix, total receipts must equal total payments for each account contained within the SAM. Since the required data is not drawn from a single source, information from various sources must be compiled and made consistent.

This working paper documents the construction of the 1994 and 1995 Mozambican social accounting matrices (SAMs). The aggregate macro-SAM is called MACSAM, and the disaggregated version is MOZAM. With 13 agricultural and two agricultural processing activities, the primary sectors are particularly well represented in MOZAM. There are also 40 commodities, and the three factors of production: agricultural and non-agricultural labour, and capital.

The 2006 Nigeria SAM was built for the dynamic CGE (DCGE) model that examined the agriculture growth and investment options for reducing poverty in Nigeria. This report provides a detailed description of this SAM, while the DCGE analysis using the SAM. The overall structure of the SAM and its components and SAM's technical guide are presented in this paper. A detailed discussion of the 2006 Nigeria SAM accounts is provided.

Two South African social accounting matrices (SAM) are described in this paper and are built on the framework originally presented in Thurlow and van Seventer (2002). The first section provides a general overview of the structure of SAMs. The second section reviews the process and data sources used to construct the South African SAMs. An important component of the SAMs is their detailed treatment of household income and expenditure drawing on household surveys. The third section describes how imbalances in the household accounts are removed using cross-entropy estimation techniques.

The last few years have seen a proliferation of attempts by various institutions to create a framework that would enable analysts to have a broad overview of all transactions in the Malawian economy. It was decided that 1998, the most recent year for which a comprehensive data set is available, would be the base year for the SAM. The National Statistical Office conducted a major household survey which provided information on budget shares, incomes and many other social-economic characteristics of households.