This paper reviews recent literature on poverty analysis in economics, with special focus on poverty alleviation policies. We classify the literature in two categories: macroeconomic and microeconomic analyses. Macroeconomic analysis of poverty has been centered on the trade-off between efficiency and equity, and provided ways to analyze this dynamic issue. Recent literature on initial inequality and subsequent growth suggests possible mechanisms, which lead to both efficiency and equity. Empirical evidence is still inconclusive, however.

Microeconomic analysis focuses on risk sharing mechanisms among rural households. Empirical studies based on household data found that close-to-perfect risk sharing is at work among rural households. However, risk sharing accompanies costs, and this is the reason why governments need to help the poor in mitigating risks. There are many ways for the government to help the poor coping with risks. The most efficient and effective way is to use a mechanism of self-selection. We describe a few examples of how the government can protect the poor from risks.

Protecting the poor is not sufficient for poverty reduction. We need to help the poor participate in economic growth. In order to find a clue to this agenda, we need to combine macroeconomic ways to analyze dynamic issues with microeconomic ways to deal with household data, and analyze possible mechanisms related to efficiency and equity at work in a more disaggregated way. We review some examples of studies of this sort, and suggest possible ways to improve these researches.

This article focuses on the efficient implementation of environmental regulations in developing countries and discusses following five issues, 1) different efficiency by the different pattern of the Command and Control (CAC) and the Market Based Instrument (MBIs), 2) theoretical implementation conditions, 3) the environmental effectiveness, 4) actual implementation conditions of the each instrument, and 5) the ideal way of environmental policy design in developing countries, followed by conclusions.

Firstly, if the CAC based emission standard would be executed by local governments, and if it would not be uniformly applied, the CAC based on the emission standard can achieve efficiency statically and in dynamically. Although the technology standard is theoretically inefficient, it has an advantage of relatively easy execution in developing countries.

Secondly, it is difficult to achieve the environmental target effectively though the Emission Charges. Moreover, the monitoring costs and administrative costs of the Emission Charges might be more than those of the CAC. However, the environmental improvement can proceed efficiently if the Emission Charges would be implemented concurrently with the reinforced CAC.

Thirdly, the Transferable Discharge Permits is a system by which an environmental target can be achieved with statical and dynamical efficiency. However, this efficiency does not always coexist with effectiveness. Moreover, the monitoring costs and the administrative costs to implement this system might be more than those of the CAC.

Lastly, it is important to take into account two aspects of environmental management system such as social capability and the Mixed Regulatory System in the selection of environmental policy in developing countries. Although indirect regulatory methods like Environmental Tax might be suitable in developing countries, the Mixed Regulatory System can be much more useful considering the difficulty of tax rate setting.

The environment for development cooperation in developing countries has been changing rapidly. Governance and management issues have become the central focal point of development assistance. Increasingly, priority is being explicitly shifted from conventional economic infrastructure to poverty and social development. Participatory and holistic approaches are more widely introduced and donor coordination is being promoted.

Japanese consulting firms have been mainly dependent on Japan's Official Development Assistance (ODA) as source of revenue as well as information, and lack strategic knowledge management that would give them an edge in the international development cooperation society. The lack of motivation and strategies to develop their own systems is due to various internal and external factors, such as low motivation of top management, lack of incentives for individual consultants, and lack of proper mechanisms within and outside the firms. The lack of interchanges among academicians/researchers and practitioners is also a constraint to improving the quality of necessary information and knowledge.

This paper also explains the current trends in international development assistance. It provides an overview of Japan's experience in ODA projects in the fields of infrastructure and urban development. Based on the lessons learned from this experience, future directions for establishing a knowledge base for the benefit of Japanese ODA and the role of consulting firms are suggested.

This paper examines recent trends in development studies education in the UK, and considers their relevance for Japanese universities. The UK development studies sector has expanded its student numbers greatly in the past two decades. However, its growth has been conditioned by financial pressures and by increasing external evaluation of its teaching and research. While these external pressures to some extent have improved teaching quality and research performance, they also have diverted staff efforts towards the short term and towards money making. One by-product of the need to recruit overseas fee-paying students is that the UK now is playing a significant role in educating a new generation of Japanese development professionals. Some problems are common to both countries, such as how to combine multi-disciplinarity with professional training, and how to help students gain the initial experience necessary to establish themselves in a career.

In Japan, most of the graduate schools related to international development (GSRID) are now focusing on practical education in addressing development issues. To this end, the overseas fieldwork (OFW) was introduced as an effective education tool, tailored to suit real development problems in the field; however, the actual situation of application is not so clear yet. Therefore, this article attempts to explore OFW's role in the 21^st century. The final aim of education for international development in Japan is to educate people who will perform activities related to international development. They require two abilities: (1) be well versed in theory and (2) be able to perform the actual tasks of international development. OFW provides students with such abilities as: (1) measuring a development phenomenon by some basic standards clearly and (2) capturing the phenomenon more accurately in the field.

A questionnaire survey results from GSRID in Japan regarding OFW shows that 4 out of 35 schools have already introduced OFW in their curriculum. Of the 31 schools that are yet to introduce OFW, 57% have plans to do so in future.

OFW has had two types of practice for study purposes. Previously, a discipline-oriented approach focusing on a specific field was popular. Recently, an interdisciplinary approach was introduced to give methodology training in the field such as PCM method, KJ method etc., to solve problems in developing areas. The latter is more pragmatic in solving real-life problems than the former, and thus, is essential for students to execute international development activities in the field. To introduce OFW, more instructors and sufficient budgets are required. However, shortfalls are still faced. Perhaps, collaborative efforts in seeking assistance from other international organizations or by combining with other counterpart universities (via academic exchange agreements) for a joint OFW would ensure that the tasks of OFW are easily carried out.

After the Liberation Policy in 1978, more attention has been paid to regional and provincial economic gap in China. The purpose of this study is to clarify economic gap in the manufacturing industry at the provincial and regional levels. The economic gap is measured by the following four macroeconomic indicators as of 1994: a level of manufacturing industry; a scale of manufacturing industry; economic efficiency of manufacturing industry; and dependency on small-scale manufacturing industry in gross regional/provincial products.

Followings are clarified from the analysis. Though a wide gap is relatively seen among the provincials in terms of the scale of industry and the dependency on small-scale industry, a gap is relatively small in the level and the economic efficiency of industry. Furthermore, it is tend that the higher the values of the scale, level and economic efficiency indicators are, the wider the provincial gap gets.

The values of those four indicators go down at the regional level from the Eastern, the Central to the Western Region. Provinces of the Eastern Region mark relatively high values in the dependency on small-scale industry as well as the rest of the indicators.

Both the scale of industry and the dependency on small-scale industry in the Central Region do not score as high as in the Eastern Region. However, there makes no big difference in terms of the economic efficiency of industry and the dependency on small-scale industry in these two regions.

Compared to provinces in the Eastern and the Central Region, the scale and the level of industry in provinces of the Western Region stay low. Moreover, the economic efficiency of industry in the region also pegs low while the region marks the lowest in the dependency on small-scale industry among the three regions.

Urban water resource management has been an important issue of concern for municipalities in water scarce regions. It is now become even more important with the increasing number of cities and the growing contribution of cities in water related issues in the light of the estimated water shortage in the next century. To avoid the worst scenario, it is of critical importance for municipalities to figure out a long-term vision of the role of cities in the nation's economy, economic structure and population size from the view point of water resource management.

Though many cities are currently facing water resource problems, they are usually recognized as local issues because of the diversity of both phenomena and measures taken. However, these local cases are representing common aspects of the issue, such as the unbalance between resource capacity and economic growth of cities, inter-regional allocation and inter-sector allocation of resources, and resource quantity versus quality.

This paper aims to present the common challenges facing urban water resource management. Through field survey and analyzing existing materials, the local lessons of Tianjin City, China, which is facing typical water resource problems, are drawn after a step-wise analysis of water flow in cities. Through the case study, it has been found that with the economic growth and urbanization process, the contribution of cities in water resource problems is increasing. These problems can not be solved independently, but rather need a systematic approach including natural ecosystem and socio-economic system in a wider region. Based on the lessons from case study, challenges facing urban water resource management and possible strategies are presented.

Among donor nations, Sweden-largely unencumbered by short-term political or economic interest-has gained the reputation of being a country most guided by its humanitarian assistance to developing countries. Established in the Government Bill of 1962 on the principle of “solidarity with the poor of the Third World” and “moral duty”, the Swedish program consistently leads other DAC donors in such criteria as aid volume and in its willingness to include radical regimes and liberation movements among its recipients. In 1974, Sweden was the first country to reach the UN's target of one percent of GNP, and its philosophy of humanitarian assistance is based on welfare policy, active involvement of NGOs in development assistance policy, and foreign policy. Such humanitarian assistance has enjoyed popular public support.

Sweden has taken measures of “country frame”, which squeezes about 20 core recipients. Country programming aims increase recipient involvement and responsibility through flexible administrative procedures and widespread program assistance.

At the present time, Sweden's development assistance policy is at a critical juncture. Since plunging into recession in 1990, criticism of its welfare policy and entry into the European Union have had repercussions on its humanitarian development assistance. As well, an aid-dependency situation has developed those who have received Swedish assistance for the past 30 years. Swedish assistance policy has shifted from 'aid on the recipient's term' towards acceptance of the mainstream structural adjustment approach approved and adopted by the rest of the donor community. Public support for development assistance has declined since 1990.

Humanitarian assistance programs have undergone a sober assessment of the difficulties and dilemmas in development assistance. Unfortunately, this had led to low organizational low accountability and disillusionment regarding humanitarian assistance on the part of the public. However, humanitarian assistance has a long-term effect on the partnership between recipients and developed countries, a relationship that is indispensable for resolving world issues.

Development aid agencies experienced a “paradigm shift” from input-oriented aid to results-oriented aid during the past decade as OECD/DAC introduced the “Development Strategy toward the 21st Century”. In Japan, Official Development Assistance (ODA) has been faced with a widespread call for more effective and efficient implementation and a shift from “volume” to “quality”. The Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), which implements most of Japan's grant-based ODA, underwent a restructuring in January 2000 that included the establishment of four Regional Departments. This reform aimed to change JICA's organizational structure from an aid scheme/entities approach to a country-regional approach.

This report explains how JICA's scheme/entities-dominant organizational structure had some difficulties in meeting the aid “paradigm shift”, especially new moves such as the World Bank's CDF and PRSP, and how JICA started the country-and issue-specific approaches in order to resolve this problem. The new country-and issue-specific approaches consist of three pillars; fundamental structural reform, the JICA Country Program Working Paper (Policy Framework, Development Objective Matrix and Project Rolling Plan), and Cooperation Guidelines for Development Issues. These new approaches, introduced in 1999-2000, are in line with the Government aid policy launched in “the Medium-Term Policy on ODA” in 1999 and “the Country Assistance Programs” in 2000. They are expected to result in more effective aid for resolving the development issues of recipient countries more directly.

There are still various issues emerging from changes in the international environment that must be tackled by JICA. Well-balanced knowledge and experience having country-specific and issue/sector-specific perspectives should be further accumulated. Organizational strengthening of the Global Issues Division will be necessary to promote expansion of the Global Issues. Consideration of the utilization of IT and a program for digital divide problems will be also one of the focal issues in operational and organizational arrangements. Aid agencies need to continually pursue innovation.

Funded by Japanese Exim Bank, Calaca Coal-Fired Thermal Power Plant Unit 1 in Calaca City, 115 km south from Metro Manila, Philippines started operation in 1984. Poor operation of the unit 1, such as overstocking of coal, resulted in fly ash and offensive odour over a neighboring village. In addition, noise and water pollution annoyed local people. Municipal assembly of Calaca City requested the NPC to stop operation of the unit 1.

In 1986, Philippine Government requested Japanese Government a concessional yen loan to establish unit 2. Having concern that local environment would further worsen, local people protested the establishment of the unit 2. Overseas Economic Cooperation Fund (OECF), Japanese implementing agency of yen loans, sent back the NPC's request for approval for the contract of construction of the once-approved project.

Philippines' emission standard system is complicated. If it is economically or technically impossible for the sources to meet the emission standards, which are equivalent to or even more stringent than that of developed nations, they are exempted from the standards. In such cases, the sources are required that concentration of pollutants in ambient air meet environmental quality standard. Calaca is this case, and this leads to misunderstanding of Japanese NGOs and mass media. They accused the Japanese government that the sulfurdioxides emission of unit 1 exceeded the emission standard and had violated the law, although the unit 1 and unit 2 in fact met Philippines' regulations. Japanese Government insisted on installation of flue gas desulfurizarion (FGD) equipment to the unit 2, which NPC strongly rejected.

Borrowing additional yen loans, NPC implemented its environmental improvement project, which did not include installation of FGD equipment. In 1992, Department of Environment and Natural Resources clearly stated that FGD was not necessary. OECF finally approved the contract of construction without FGD in 1993. Construction of unit 2 was completed in 1995 after overall delay in project implementation at 41 months. Simulation of sulfuroxides concentration in ambient air carried out by OECF in 1998 showed that the maximum concentration would not exceed the environment quality standard.

Most of economists stated that there was no reasonable alternative to introduction of the currency board arrangement into Bulgaria as an instrument of fast resort to financial stabilization. It was the precondition for financial support by the IMF and other institutions. The fixed exchange rate of the overvalued national currency set by the currency board, however, will dangerously depress exports, make imports more attractive and delay economic revival and growth. This may discredit the efforts for financial stabilization, including the currency board arrangement itself.

The Copenhagen criteria do not contain any overall quantitative indicator to assess the readiness of the applicant countries. There is a high correlation between the development of a market economy and its competitiveness on the one hand, and GDP per capita on the other. GDP per capita of $12000 at PPP rates is necessary to have decently functioning markets and satisfactorily competitive economies. In 1998 Bulgarian GDP per capita at PPP was $4600. Bulgaria has no chance for the EU accession at a GDP per capita that is five times lower than the EU average. The gap must be reduced substantially. If GDP grows by 2% per annum in the EU and by 4% in Bulgaria and the other Eastern European countries at 1998 PPP rates, Bulgaria will achieve only 32-33% of the EU level by 2015.

In Cologne on 10 June 1999, 15 EU member countries, United States, Russia, South Eastern European countries, OSCE etc., that is 26 countries and 3 organizations adopted a Stability Pact for South Eastern Europe. This Stability Pact listed up projects equivalent to 3,866 million EUR for South Eastern Europe and for Bulgaria 18 projects.

To achieve 4% GDP growth and stability of South Eastern Europe, it is necessary to allocate limited resources by industrial policy not only to develop infrastructures as hardware but also to support small and medium-sized enterprises to increase competitiveness and grow GDP as software. To overcome the backwardness of this region as a periphery of Europe since the 19^th century, the EU enlargement should be pursued as a policy matter for conscious resource allocation towards backward regions.

The purpose of this study is to examine the effectiveness of residents' participation, especially in resident-centered process, in improvement and development activities of slums and squatter settlements in Pakistan, with reference to its case in Karachi and Islamabad.

Most developing countries including Pakistan faced heavy and rapid urban population growth in and after the nineteen fifties. Slums and squatter settlements received low-income groups and expanded in urban areas of developing countries because their governments and urban governmental authorities had not enough capacity and capability to provide several types of public service including housing. Many projects for urban development as well as improvement of the slums and squatter settlements were conducted by the governments and the authorities, but few brought about fruitful results. The residents' participation in the development activities is an answer to effectively improving the living environment of the slums and squatter settlements.

A case study of Orangi, a squatter settlement in Karachi, Pakistan, shows some aspects in process of forming residents' participation, for example asking leaders in the local area to be a social organizer to support the establishment and management of small residents' groups. In Islamabad, several residents' organizations were established in squatter settlements to help form and encourage participatory development activities, mainly improving the living environment. It is hypothesized that keys are sustainment of motivation to participate in a development program and careful consideration of social structures for well-organized residents' participation in the development activities of the slums and squatter settlements.