THE IMPACT OF REMITTANCES ON REGIONAL CONSUMPTION AND INVESTMENT

This paper examines the effects of international remittances on regional economic development using spatial data from an original household survey carried out in the Republic of Moldova. I analyze remittance flows with a model that estimates regional (urban and rural) budget shares of consumption and investment expenditure categories for rural and urban households. An important contribution of the paper is that it analyzes the effect of remittances in the regions where spending takes place, which is not necessarily the same as the region where the households originating this spending reside. Using the multinomial logit approach, I control for potential selectivity and endogeneity biases of remittances. The results show that remittances lead to significantly increasing marginal productive investments in urban regions at the expense of rural regions. The fundamental finding of the study is that remittances influence the flight of productive capital out of rural areas into urban regions (a pattern similar to the crowding‐out effect of the Dutch Disease). The analysis carried out in this paper can be applied to other temporary income transfers and exogenous spending injected in the region that affect households' regional expenditure patterns.     

The Impact of Global Financial Crisis on the Mechanism of Economic Growth in Russia

A noted specialist on the Russian economy presents an assessment of the impact of the global financial crisis on the mechanism of the country's economic growth. Focusing on the demand side of the economic ledger, the author explores the question of whether Russia will be able to re-attain the high economic growth rates of the period from 2000 to 2007 after recovering from the crisis. The paper analyzes the sharp drop in production in 2008 and the first quarter of 2009, attributing most of the damage to liquidity problems and declines in the price of oil. Empirical evidence is based primarily on data collected by the author from the Central Bank of Russia and the country's federal bureau of statistics (Rosstat). Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: E010, E200, E660, F210, G010. 11 figures, 3 tables, 29 references.     

从国际侨汇新动向看我国侨汇政策

近 3 0多年来 ,国际侨汇的数量急剧增长 ,侨汇的作用也发生了重大变化。据国际基金组织 2 0 0 0年度国际收支报告 ,目前全球侨汇总额已超过 1 0 0 0亿美元 ,约为 3 0年前的 5 0倍 ,其中60 %流向发展中国家。印度侨汇每年多达 1 0 0亿美元 ,高居榜首 ,紧跟其后的是墨西哥和菲律宾等发展中国家。值得注意的是 ,在许多发展中国家利用侨汇发展经济的时候 ,中国对侨汇工作却由于外资输入的不断增加而有所忽视。中国 1 982 1 999年 1 8年的侨汇收入总额只有 1 1 0亿美元 ,仅相当于印度1 999年一年的侨汇收入。笔者认为 ,我国有关部门应当关注侨汇工作 ,充分认识侨汇资源的重要意义 ,采取有效措施 ,更好地为经济建设服务。     

MIGRATION AND THE WELL-BEING OF THE ‘LEFT BEHIND’ IN ASIA

This paper serves as an introduction to the three substantive papers in this themed section on the impact of migration on the well-being of the ‘left behind’ in Asia. In the light of recent migration trends such as the ‘feminization’ of migration and ‘brain-drain’ of health workers in the region, the paper provides a brief review of the existing scholarly literature on the vulnerability of different groups of the 'left behind’, particularly women, children and the elderly. It argues that a multi-dimensional approach is needed, taking into consideration not only the economic impact of remittances but also factors such as social networks and gender effects.     

(Mal)Development in Central America: Globalization and Social Change

This article develops a globalization framework and a model of transnational processes for analysing social change and development, and then applies the model to Central America. The analysis emphasizes determinacy, in the last instance, of social forces in historic developmental outcomes, and documents how social forces in struggles in an emergent transnational environment have shaped Central America's changing profile within the global economy and society. Revolutionary movements, a new class structure, US geo-political considerations, and the internationalization of East Asian economies, have all contributed to a new model of development; from the 1960s into the 1990s the national model of development is being replaced by a transnational model. Maquiladora garment production, tourism, non-traditional agricultural exports, and remittances from emigrant workers are coming to eclipse traditional agro-exports as the most dynamic economic sectors linking the region to globalized circuits of production and distribution. The article also examines Central American migration to the US and gender dimensions of the new transnational model of development.     

GENDER AND THE REMITTANCE PROCESS

This study explores and suggests a methodological approach to the gender dimensions of remittances. It argues that remittances should be seen as a social process and examined in relation to (i) the sending side, (ii) the recipient side and (iii) gendered use of remittances by the households. Focusing on Indonesian domestic workers in Singapore, Malaysia and Hong Kong, and migrant households in Central Java, it explores the gender dimensions of remittance-sending, receiving, control and use, and their development implications. Despite their lower incomes, female domestic workers remit a greater share of their earnings than their male counterparts; they tend to remit to their mothers and sisters rather than to fathers, brothers and husbands. Close to half of the recipients exercise discretion over the use of remittances; female recipients tend to use remittances to invest in human capital and male recipients, in physical capital.     

China's Emergence and Impact on Technology in East Asia: The Case of Machinebuilding

Two Taiwan-based economists estimate the technology content of exports by the machinebuilding industry of the East Asia region during 2004-2008, using comparative analysis to clarify changes in the relative competitiveness of four East Asian nations (China, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan) accompanying the formation of a regional trading bloc and production networks. In particular, they examine the technology content of these countries' machinebuilding sub-industries' exports within the Southeast Asian market (documenting the rise of the machinebuilding industry in China) as well as the penetration of Japanese, South Korean, and Taiwanese sub-industries into China's market. The results point to areas of emerging competition among China, South Korea, Japan, and Taiwan for East Asian markets, which can only be expected to intensify in the future. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: F14, F15, F36, O14, P23. 7 tables, 36 references.     

The Global Economic Crisis and Unemployment in China

Two noted academic specialists on labor economics and population statistics of China examine the impacts of the global economic crisis of 2008-2009 on the job security of urban workers, and the ensuing repercussions for the Chinese society and economy. More specifically, they probe and determine the magnitude of urban unemployment in China in 2008 and 2009 as it appears to be reported in different segments of the country's immense labor market. A particular focus of the paper is on differences in unemployment among two groups of workers (those with urban hukou vis-à-vis rural migrant workers) with significantly different sets of rights and privileges, as well as levels of job security. The authors also provide an estimate of the urban unemployment rate in 2009 that differs from the official rate. They argue that measures toward further integration of rural and urban labor markets and reducing natural unemployment are ultimately more beneficial than short-term interventions to adjust cyclical joblessness stemming from the global economic crisis and recession.     

The "Crisis" Geography of Contemporary Russia

Against the background of structural and geographical changes that brought about the economic crises of the 1990s in the Russian Federation and subsequent recovery in the early years of the 21st century, the authors analyze the challenges of (and responses to) the 2008 global economic and financial crisis in Russia. Quantitative data derived from official sources and the authors' own research is used to analyze developments at a variety of spatial scales, including inter- and intra-regional, urban and rural. The noted authors speculate about possible exit paths from the crisis and their impacts on spatial differentiation within the Russian Federation. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: F210, G010, O150, O180. 6 figures, 1 table, 55 references.     

Population Trends in Europe's Poorest Country: Results of the Most Recent Census of Moldova

An American population geographer and specialist on demographic trends in the former Soviet republics examines the results of the first post-Soviet census of Moldova (the poorest country of Europe), conducted in 2004 and released years later. He reviews major national- and regional-level changes in population size, urban/rural distribution, and ethnicity since the last Soviet-era census in 1989 and reconciles the two sets of data. A major factor complicating the analysis is the de facto secession in 1992 of an eastern region of the country, now known as the Pridnestrovskaya Moldavskaya Republic (PMR), which prompted a brief war and subsequent uneasy ceasefire later that year. However, a population enumeration conducted in the PMR, also in 2004 (and released later), facilitates the identification of overall demographic trends in the region, which may experience the involuntary return of jobless migrant workers from Russia and the EU due to the 2008/2009 global recession. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: J110, O180, R230. 2 figures, 2 tables, 49 references.     

The Samoan Farmer: A Reluctant Object of Change?

Stagnation and a failure to break out of a subsistence-oriented type of production continue to characterize the agricultural sector in Western Samoa. The lack of dynamism in agriculture has variously been ascribed to subsistence affluence and limited wants, the inhibiting impact of fa'asamoa – the Samoan way of life – and, more recently, to the effects of migration, remittances, aid and bureaucracy on economic development. This article suggests that the explanatory power of these factors by themselves is unsatisfactory. Instead, it argues that an absence of secure market outlets offering predictable and sufficiently attractive prices to farmers and the lack of rural-urban links in general are at the heart of the problem. The economy seems to be caught in a vicious circle where farmers fail to commit themselves to production for the market because of a lack of secure outlets, while adequate downstream distribution and processing channels do not develop for lack of secure supplies. The interchangeable nature of commercial and subsistence production in agriculture, widespread access to overseas remittances, and the smallness of the domestic economy serve to perpetuate the deadlock.     

World City Network Integration in the Eurasian Realm

A team of authors from the Globalization and World Cities (GaWC) research network explores the main empirical features of the global economic integration of Eurasia through an analysis of the (shifting) position of that macroregion's key cities. More specifically, they examine the gateway roles played by key cities in four major subregions—China, the former Eastern Bloc (FEB, i.e., Central and Eastern Europe), former Soviet Union (FSU), and India—in the channeling of transnational flows of capital, goods, knowledge, and people in 2000-2008, focusing on the globalization of firms in the financial and business service sectors. Although cities in the four subregions share a common recent history of transition from closed and state-centered to open and market-based economies, the study reveals the persistence of distinctive geographical idiosyncrasies in their connections across the globe. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: F020, F200, O180, P300. 4 figures, 3 tables, 1 appendix, 39 references.     

Not Sustainable: India's Trade and Current Account Deficits

India's trade balance and current account have shown persistent deficits for a major part of its post‐independence period. Since the mid‐2000s, trade deficits have increased perilously, with a sharp rise in both oil and non‐oil imports. India has relied on services exports, remittances and capital inflows to offset trade deficits and sustain the current account deficit. This article examines the sustainability of relying on capital inflows, remittances and services exports to sustain these persistent trade and current account deficits. It argues that all three sources entail elements of fragility. The recent global economic slowdown, economic recessions in the United States and Europe, slow economic recovery, low growth forecasts and possibility of a secular slowdown in the United States and Europe raise questions about whether services exports and remittances can continue to generate sufficient earnings to offset trade deficits. Relying on capital inflows also carries risks of financial fragility, with short‐term capital inflows and external commercial borrowings becoming more prominent in the Indian economy.     

Family and Collective Remittances to Mexico: A Multi‐dimensional Typology

The development potential of remittances has resurfaced as a topic of analysis, based in part on dramatic increases in migration and amounts of money ‘sent home’, and partly in the growing interest and involvement by states and non‐state actors in gaining leverage over remittances. The trend is indicative of an emerging remittance‐based component of development and poverty reduction planning. This article uses the case of Mexico to make two broad arguments, one related to the importance of extra‐economic dimensions of remittances, particularly the social and political meanings of remittances, and the other based on a disaggregation of remittances into family, collective or community‐based, and investment remittances. Key dimensions of this typology include the constellation of remitters, receivers, and mediating institutions; the norms and logic(s) that regulate remittances; the uses of remittances (income versus savings); the social and political meanings of remittances; and the implications of such meanings for various interventions. The author concludes that policy and programme interventions need to recognize the specificity of each remittance type. Existing initiatives to bank the un‐banked and reduce transfer costs, for example, are effective for family remittances, but attempts to expand the share of remittances allocated to savings, or to turn community donations into profitable ventures, or small investments into large businesses, are much more complex and require a range of other interventions.     

A Note on the Extremities of Local Moran's Iis and Their Impact on Global Moran's I

By defining local Moran's I_i as a ratio of quadratic forms and making use of its overall additivity to match global Moran's I, we can identify spatial objects with a strong impact on global Moran's I. First, we concentrate on the spatial properties of local Moran's I_i expressed by the local linkage degree. Depending on whether we use the W- or C-coding of the spatial connectivity matrix, the variance of local Moran's I_i for a small local linkage degree will be either large or small. Note that spatial objects associated with a local Moran's I_i with a large variance affect the global statistic much more than spatial objects associated with a local Moran's I_i with a small variance. Counterintuitively, global Moran's I defined in the W-coding is most influenced by spatial objects with a small number of spatial neighbors. In contrast, spatial objects with a large number of spatial neighbors exert more impact on global Moran's I setup in the C-coding. Second, we investigate the impact of the empirical data on local Moran's I_i and show that local Moran's I_i will only be significant for extreme absolute residuals at and around the reference location. Clusters of average regression residuals cannot be detected by local Moran's I_i. Consequently, spatial cliques of extreme residuals contribute more to significance tests on global autocorrelation.     

China's Nuclear Energy in Light of the Disaster in Japan

An American specialist on Russian agriculture examines that country's agrarian policy, as well as the agricultural sector more generally, one year into the presidency of Dmitriy Medvedev. Focusing on the three key policy issues—state financial support, state intervention in the grain market, and international food trade policy—he assesses the extent to which current policy represents a continuation of that prevailing during the presidency of Vladimir Putin. The author discusses the appointment of a new Agriculture Minister in 2009, which may signal a different approach to the management of the sector, and concludes with an assessment of the impact of the global financial crisis. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: F130, Q100, Q170, Q180. 2 tables, 63 references.     

Ukraine's Financial Crisis, 2009

A prominent specialist in the economic affairs of the former Soviet Union relates and analyzes the state of Ukraine's economy in light of a series of discussions and interviews with the country's Prime Minister and leading economic officials in Kyiv in 2008 and April 2009. The author, a former economic advisor to the country's government and co-chair of the UN's Blue Ribbon Commission for Ukraine, devotes this paper to a penetrating analysis of the impact of the global financial crisis of 2008-2009 on Ukraine's budget, banks, exchange rates, money supply, industrial sectors (particularly energy and steel), GDP, and inflationary pressures. Due attention is given to economic relations with the EU and Russia as well as to financial assistance from the IMF.Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: E500, E600, O520, P200. 1 table, 4 figures, 38 references.     

The Global Flea Market: Migration,Remittances and the Informal Economy in Tonga

Some common assumptions about the form and use of migrants' remittances in the South Pacific are examined and questioned in the light of information from a micro-economic study of one group of remittance recipients in the flea market of Nuku'alofa, the capital of the Kingdom of Tonga. The findings of this study suggest that economic analysis and policy recommendations based on the existing macro-economic data on recorded remittances and other economic aggregates should be treated with caution. The unrecorded inflows of remittances in kind and the associated spread of the domestic informal sector have had some important implications for the functioning of Tonga's economy. There is some evidence to suggest that the growth of informal, international trade is fostering other significant changes in the domestic economy. The functioning of remittance-dependent economies such as Tonga is much more complex than existing economic analysis suggests, and involves substantial investment – not just consumption – with the emergence of entrepreneurs and the manipulation of dependence, rather than merely passive receipt of cash and expenditure focused on consumption.     

China's Exports and Imports of Agricultural Products under the WTO

An American economic geographer specializing in the agricultural sector of China's economy presents a study of that country's trade in agricultural products. The paper is focused on patterns of change in the regional distribution of agricultural and aquacultural exports and imports before and after China's accession to the World Trade Organization in 2001. Drawing on research during the course of a field trip in July 2008 and utilizing data compiled by China's Customs Bureau, the author provides a comprehensive assessment of the country's trade with 10 major world regions through the year 2007. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: F14, F40, O13, Q17. 1 figure, 4 tables, 32 references.