AES 2023 - Discours d'ouverture / Session 1 : Les défis de la politique monétaire

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” With these words Charles Dickens opens his novel “A Tale of Two Cities”. Winners and losers in a “tale of two commodities” may one day look back with similar reflections, as prices of metals and oil have seen some seismic shifts in recent weeks, months and years. This blog seeks to explain how demand — but also supply and financial market conditions — are affecting metals prices. We will show some contrast with oil, where suppl ...

Sub-Saharan Africa’s trade flows increased sharply, multiplying by a factor of five over the past 20 years. Is this boom built on commodities only?  My answer is no ! Many countries have increased their integration in global value chains. But, it is also clear that sub-Saharan Africa still has some way to go. Increased trade boosts for growth Over the last two decades, the export-to-GDP ratio in sub-Saharan Africa increased from 20½ percent in 1995 to 27½ percent in 2013. This occ ...

The 16th Annual Global Development Conference has been dedicated this year to the theme of ‘Agriculture for Sustainable Growth: Challenges and Opportunities for a New ‘Green Revolution’.  One of the sub-themes that has been addressed during this event is related to the design of the optimal agricultural policy supposed to lead towards development, especially in low-income countries. The objective of this blog is to cover the key elements that make an agricultural policy successful a ...

« Les asymétries et l’instabilité du marché des matières premières dans les pays en développement : politiques et impacts sur le développement », une problématique d’un intérêt particulier pour ces pays, a fait l’objet d’un séminaire de recherche organisé par la Fondation pour les Etudes et Recherches sur le Développement International (Ferdi), les 24 et 25 juin 2015 à Clermont-Ferrand. Cet évènement a été tenu la veille du workshop co-organisé par la Ferdi et OCP Policy Center le 2 ...