Least Developed Countries Category

The present Policy Note takes stock of the nature of the financial, technical and institutional support and preferential trade-related treatments that have been provided to LDCs. It provides an assessment of how useful these existing support measures have been and identifies ways in which they can be made more effective and, where needed, complemented by additional interventions. It also calls for greater coherence between international strategy for LDCs and other existing development strategies, including those initiated by the IMF and the World Bank, to further facilitate development of LDCs. The Note was prepared to contribute to the debate leading up to the forthcoming Fourth UN Conference on the LDCs in Istanbul, Turkey, in 2011.

Equatorial Guinea

Equatorial Guinea

Cabo Verde Mal

The Committee for Development Policy (CDP) launched today the second edition of the Handbook on the Least Developed Country Category: Inclusion, Graduation and Special Support Measures at a briefing in New York. The Handbook contains a detailed description of the procedures and methodologies used by the CDP in the identification of least developed countries (LDCs), as well as an overview of the international support measures associated with the LDC category. As a supplement to the Handbook, the LDC 2015 Country Snapshots was also presented at the briefing. The Country Snapshots is a compilation of one-page profiles for each of the 48 countries classified as LDCs in 2015 and illustrates the gaps in progress towards the LDC graduation thresholds for each country.

Samoa

The present paper reviews policy efforts to advance growth and development in the least developed countries, in particular those efforts aimed at promoting well-being by reducing vulnerability to economic shocks. The paper draws on empirical research analysing the relationships between economic vulnerability, growth and policy. Given that domestic policy efforts are weakened by the shocks that characterize vulnerability, the international community has an important role to play in countries.

Achieving poverty reduction in the least developed countries will require the mobilization of substantial financial resources. At the country level it will depend on (a) improved budgetary management and revenue collection and enhanced private savings and investment opportunities; (b) the generation of foreign exchange, through increased exports and remittances; (c) the ability, in partnership with donors, to reduce existing debt burdens while increasing the quantity, quality and effectiveness of new aid flows; and (d) the ability to attract private capital (investment and commercial inflows) and to reverse capital flight where it has occurred. In designing institutions for good governance, an interactive process between donors and recipient countries is essential.

This paper examines innovative approaches to domestic resource mobilization in selected Least Developed Countries. It covers various aspects of domestic resource mobilization with focus on the linkages to poverty reduction and growth. The areas addressed in this paper include: financial sector reform policies for growth and poverty reduction, Microfinancing, taxation for growth and poverty reduction, management of domestic debt, government spending targeted to crowd in private savings and investment (including public-private partnerships), and mobilization of private capita, including reversal of capital flight and more innovative and active participation in the international trade.