This short paper, in its eighth edition, provides private and public investment data through 1995. Although the growing empirical literature on privatization has almost invariably found that the transfer of assets from public to private hands yields both efficiency and welfare gains, there has been a surprising lack of research on the macroeconomic consequences of privatization. This report addresses that issue briefly, exploring the impact of privatization on private fixed investment. As a starting point, the dimensions of the privatization revolution are summarized with special emphasis on the contribution made by foreign investors. Data on investment commitments stemming from privatization are also presented. The final section offers some econometric insights into the importance of privatization as a determinant of private investment in developing countries. The report concludes that privatization of state-owned enterprises is likely to have a multiplier effect on private investment and is, therefore, an important ingredient of governments' efforts to improve the business climate and to step up the pace of economic development. Appendix 1 discusses the methods and sources used; Appendix 2 presents tables with investment figures in terms of five ratios; Appendix 3 graphs the data by region; and Appendix 4 discusses the econometric results.

Private investment in developing countries continued its upward trend in 1996, the most recent year for which data exist, on an unweighted average basis. Public investment rates continued a decline that began in the early 1980s. The largest increases in private investment between 1995 and 1996 occurred in Malawi, Mauritania, Benin, Papua New Guinea, and Bolivia, suggesting that the private firms in some of the world's poorest countries are showing a strong supply response. This year's edition includes statistics for four major Organization for Economic Co-operation & Development (OECD) countries for comparison with developing country trends. It also includes a discussion of domestic capital markets in financing private investment; even though stock and bond markets have grown at a rapid rate, they play only a minor role in financing investment in the developing countries where banks are a more important source of financing.

La edicion de 2001 se centra en la relacion entre inversion publica e inversion privada. El foco de este a?o esta en la calidad de la inversion publica, de su interaccion con la corrupcion, y del impacto que resulta en la inversion privada.

This is the tenth annual edition of "Trends in Private Investment in Developing Countries." To mark this event, this report includes figures for each of the countries for which data are available as well as the first country-specific results of a worldwide survey on obstacles to doing business perceived by executives in 74 countries (including several industrial countries for comparison). The first part of this report documents trends in private and public fixed investment. The second part presents country-specific results of a 1996/97 worldwide survey of business executives. The discussion focus on obstacles to doing business and their relationship to levels of private investment. A few factors emerge as being of particular importance to private investment decisions:the real exchange rate, the rule of law, predictability of judiciary systems, and the extent to which financing is available to enterprises.

IFC Discussion Paper No. 25. Presents tables and graphs of updated statistics on private investment in developing countries between 1980 and 1993. Text focuses on capital flows that contribute to the financing of private investment. This six

This paper analyzes the effects of several policy and other macro-economic variables on the ratio of private investment to GDP in developing countries. Using data for a sample of 23 developing countries over the period 1975-87, the econometric evidence indicates that the rate of private investment is positively related to the real growth rate of GDP, public sector investment, and to a lesser extent the level of per capita GDP, while it is negatively related to domestic inflation, the debt service ratio, the debt-to-GDP ratio, and high real interest rates. There is also some indication that all but the last of these variables had a greater impact before the onset of the debt crisis in 1982, while the debt-to-GDP ratio (a measure of a country’s debt overhang) has become more important since then.

This is the tenth annual edition of "Trends in Private Investment in Developing Countries." To mark this event, this report includes figures for each of the countries for which data are available as well as the first country-specific results of a worldwide survey on obstacles to doing business perceived by executives in 74 countries (including several industrial countries for comparison). The first part of this report documents trends in private and public fixed investment. The second part presents country-specific results of a 1996/97 worldwide survey of business executives. The discussion focus on obstacles to doing business and their relationship to levels of private investment. A few factors emerge as being of particular importance to private investment decisions:the real exchange rate, the rule of law, predictability of judiciary systems, and the extent to which financing is available to enterprises.

The aim of the research described in this volume is to examine the behavior of private domestic investment in a sample of seven developing economies: Chile, Colombia, Egypt, Indonesia, Morocco, Turkey, and Zimbabwe. The studies represent a first step toward understanding the investment process in developing countries and the scope for government policy to affect private capital formation. Such issues will become increasingly important in the future as more developing countries try to encourage private investment. Four key issues emerge in the analysis of the determinants of private investment and its role in adjustment programs in developing countries. The first is the impact of changes in the exchange rate; the second major concern is the existence of crowding out of private activity as a result of government borrowing in domestic financial markets through interest rates or quantity rationing. A third and related issue is whether government spending, particularly that on investment, "crowds in" or "crowds out" private capital formation. Fourth, the effects of uncertainty are important in determining the response of private agents to changes in the incentive structure.

IFC Discussion Paper No. 38.QUOTEIt is now universally acknowledged that ownership matters; that private ownership in and of itself is a major determinant of good performance in firms... Decent economic policy and well-functioning legal and administrative institutions... matter greatly as well.QUOTEThis paper looks at what happens when the shift to private ownership gets far out in front of the effort to build the institutional underpinnings of a capitalist economy. The emphasis is on what went wrong and why and what, if anything, can be done to be correct it. Proposals include renationalization and/or postponement of further privatization, both to be accompanied by measures to strengthen the managerial capacities of the state. Neither approach seems likely to produce short-term improvements. The regrettable fact is that governments that botch privatization are equally likely to botch the management of state-owned firms. In a number of Central European transition countries, privatization is living up to expectations; and there is no need for such measures. For institutionally-weak countries, the less dramatic but reasonable short-term course of action is to push ahead more slowly with case- by-case and tender privatization in cooperation with the international assistance community in hopes of producing some success stories that will lead by example.