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That consumers must attend annual book fairs to buy their books is reflective of the kind of inefficient distribution model that has plagued publishing in the region-something that must change if the industry is to grow and thrive. But at the same time, the consumer element is a strong part of the region's culture-and a potential advantage for the SIBF.  links of london necklaces

"This is how it is done in most of the Arab world," explained Sheikha Bodour Al Qassimi, founder and CEO of publisher Kalimat, and the daughter of Sharjah's ruler, Sheikh Sultan bin Mohamed Al-Qassimi. Sheikha Bodour is a driving force behind efforts to establish a more modern, international publishing regime throughout the UAE. Sheikha Bodour, however, does not want to lose the traditional consumer aspect of the SIBF. "Publishers really enjoy meeting their consumers and interacting with them like this," she said. "It is very important."  discount links of london

Mulliken agreed-in fact, he envisions promoting the SIBF as not only a chance to network and strike deals in a region still mostly untapped by Western publishers-but also as a great place to actually sell books by the box load.  links of london bracelets

If you're skeptical about opportunities in the region it's understandable. Historically, the Arab book market has been a complex mix of patchwork copyright law, inefficient distribution, frustrating bookselling rules, and limited demand. And that's to say nothing of a lingering cultural divide with the West. That gap, however, is shrinking. English, for example, is commonly spoken is the region. While establishing a market in the UAE that can attract-and reward-American publishers may not be an overnight proposition, the efforts underway both to modernize the industry, and to boost literacy and literary culture, are making considerable progress links of london bangles

My wife and I live in a technology vortex. Things that work for everybody else go dumb and useless in our hands, which means just about everything these days: computers, phones, clocks, and TVs, coffee makers, stoves, and children's toys. Our hard drives fizzle, wither and die. Our Wi-Fi connections wander and fade. Our Internet connection drops out more than John Edwards. My wife and I reboot more than most jockeys. discount links of london

This time of year we get our daughters dolls and mechanical animals that are supposed to cry, laugh and yelp. Most of them just sit around, as sad and silent as discarded department store mannequins. links of london bracelets

The philosopher Jonathon Schorr coined the term technology vortex for an invisible whirling mass that hovers over some of us to suck the vitality out of our technological devices.

Now, I know there are some technology vortex deniers. My wife and I are confronted with many inconvenient truths. links of london bangles

I have so many computer problems at work that that our information technology department gave me a frequent caller card. When I do interviews during the week, we think we've made a satellite link to famous authors or film stars in London or Paris, then suddenly hear a lot of stomping boots from a live performance of the Ukrainian Army National Ballet. links of london sale

At home, my wife and I spend as much time talking to Mac technical support personnel in Bangalore as we do our cousins in California. Our Tivo routinely ignores our careful instructions to record "Law and Order" reruns, and instead saves us the weekly meeting of the Mississauga Town Council. Every time we try to use a global positioning system to get to Canarsie or Skokie, it routes us through Katmandu.

Most people would recognize that growth is good for the poor. Countries that have been able to reduce poverty significantly during the second half of the twentieth century are those countries that benefited from sustained output growth over prolonged periods of time. Sweetie Bracelet More recently the experience of the transitional economies of Eastern Europe and of the Former Soviet Union has shown that the deep recession of the 1990s resulted in a sharp rise in poverty whereas the most recent growth period reversed this trend contributing to reduce poverty. A World Bank study on growth, poverty and inequality in transitional economies concluded that: "The single most important factor behind the significant decline in poverty in the period in question (1998-2003) is high growth in the CIS, where the bulk of the poor reside." (World Bank 2005, p.3). links of london sweetie bracelet

The question of the relation between growth and poverty is not so much around the 'if' but rather around the 'when' and the 'how' output growth trickles down to the poor. Output growth does not always trickle down to the poor as much or as fast as we would like and this fact has generated a hot debate among economists about whether economic policies should focus simply on growth or on pro-poor growth. Technically, output growth is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for poverty reduction. links of london It is not necessary because a country could be in the middle of a recession and still being able to reduce poverty via redistributive economic policies. It is not sufficient because we could have exceptional output growth generated by sectors that do not redistribute resources to the poor. Moreover, even if we observe a simple covariance of output growth and poverty reduction at the national level, this is not ne cessarily evidence of causation and may also hide more complex regional dynamics. links of london charms

The paper challenges the conventional wisdom that when output growth and poverty reduction coexist there must be a causal relation between the two. This has important implications for economic theory and economic policies. links of london sale If poverty reduction is considered a worthwhile objective for a society then growth models should emphasise the time dimension and help to better understand the functioning of the entire economic cycle of growth and poverty. On the other hand, economic policies that aim at reducing poverty fast need to look beyond the covariance of growth and poverty at the national level and focus instead on the microeconomic short-term dynamics that characterize these variables. links of london earrings

The paper is organized as follows. First, data, poverty and inequality measures and decomposition methods are discussed including recent contributions to the measurement of pro-poor growth. Second, we look at the sources of growth and decompose GDP growth into its regional and sector components. Third, we turn to poverty and provide a profile and decomposition of this measure into regional factors. Fourth, we focus on inequality and decompose it into intra-regional and inter-regional components. links of london rings Fifth, we look at poverty changes and decompose these changes into growth and inequality effects to see the degree of each factor contribution. Sixth, we ask the question of whether growth has been pro-poor in the regions using a pro-poor index recently developed. Seventh, we run a number of multivariate and bivariate OLS regressions to assess covariance between growth, poverty and inequality across regions. Eight, we plot the same variables to derive links of london jewellery

some additional insights into short-term dynamics with a non parametric approach. And last, we make an attempt to recompose the complex puzzle emerged and provide a rationale to explain the facts.

The commonly used method for measuring commodity concentration is based on the calculation of Gini coefficient and the modified version called Gini-Hirschman coefficient of concentration (United Nations, 2004; Samen, 2006). However, Low, Olarreaga and Suarez (1998) used three different concentration indices namely Herfindal-Hirschman concentration index, Theil-entropy coefficient and Mean Logarithm deviation to investigate if globalization has affected the concentration indices. links of london sale Their findings indicated, among others, that although world trade has increased overtime, globalization does not affect the concentration indices. According to Kali, Mendez and Reyes (2007), empirical measures of trade characteristics or trade structures are limited. In analyzing trade structure and economic growth, they used trade dispersion among trading partners as one of the measures of trade structure. As in Low, Olarreaga and Suarez (1998), Kali, Mendez and Reyes (2007) constructed a Herfindahl-Hirschman concentration index of trade for all countries to measure trade dispersion among all trading partners. The study found trade concentration to be positively correlated with growth for all countries, but the effect is found to be more pronounced for poor countries. links of london earrings

In a separate study, Ishido (2004) used a less rigorous method by applying the coefficient of variation as a proxy to measure manufacturing capability cum trade divergence in selected Asian economies. Ishido found that in these countries when more technology-enhancing economic activities were undertaken within an economy, export became more divergent. links of london rings  In order to access the possibility of future trade integration among seven South Asian countries, Pitigala (2005) investigated certain fundamental conditions (as defined by empirical evidence) as criterions for a successful trading bloc. Among the statistical measures used in his report is concentration of exports index. His study revealed that with the exception of India, the exports of most South Asian countries were highly concentrated and the prospects of increasing regional trade did not appear to be encouraging. links of london jewellery

In line with Kali, Mendez and Reyes (2007), Pitigala (2005) and Low, Olarreaga and Suarez (1998), this study will focus on the export component of trade as means to measure commodity concentration and geographic concentration. The advantage of using these measurements is that they allow for product level as well as country-level examination which could be used to gauge the prospects for the possibility of Malaysia to reach the status of industrialized economy by the year 2020. Charm Bracelet  Since there has been no such effort to investigate the economy at the disaggregated level, the findings of this paper would serve to provide useful information for the formulation of strategies which would enhance regional economic integration between Malaysia and its trading partners. The details of the measurements are described in the next section. Sweetie Bracelet

Although official national accounts statistics for Malaysia were published in 1955, the data from 1955 to 1970 were not very useful as they were in two different series. Lim (1973) found that in the first series, for the period of 1955 to 1966, the data were subject to a considerable degree of error while in the second series, for the period of 1960 to 1970, he concluded that the data contained major revisions due to the acquisition of a more reliable and comprehensive set of data. Hence, acknowledging the obstacle encountered in the shortage of reliable data, the period of 1970 to 2003 was taken into consideration. The source of data for commodity exports in local currency (Malaysian Ringgit) was taken directly from Bank Negara (various issues), and International Trade Statistics Yearbook (various issues) whereas the source of data for geographic exports in US dollars was taken directly from International Monetary Fund, Direction of Trade Statistics (various issues). links of london sweetie bracelet

As a measure of export concentration, two types of coefficients will be used; links of london one for measuring commodity concentration and the other for geographical concentration of exports. The commonly used method for measuring commodity concentration is based on the calculation of Gini coefficient and the modified version called Gini-Hirschman coefficient of concentration written as

The cut-off point used by Pitigala (2005) to compute the concentration of exports index for seven South Asian countries is 75%. He defined the concentration of exports as the number of products accounted for 75% of total export growth of a country to the rest of the world at SITC 4-digit product classification. However, due to inaccessibility of data for Malaysia at this disaggregated level, we measure the concentration of exports differently. links of london charms In our study, the geographic concentration index has been classified under three categories, namely 5 percent, 1 percent and 0.3 percent of exports. 5 percent of exports signify the countries where at least 5 percent of Malaysia exports are destined and similar definition applies to 1 percent and 0.3 percent. It is important to note that the number of countries varies in the range of 3 to 5 under the first category (i.e. 5 percent), while in the case of second and third category (1 percent and 0.3 percent) the number lies in the range of 14 to 19 and 23 to 31, respectively. links of london necklaces Therefore the value of the coefficients of geographic concentration showing complete diversification under the above stated three cases will be ... when the highest number in the range is used, respectively. discount links of london

Besides using these two types of measurements i.e. commodity concentration and geographic concentration as the explanatory variables, this study adopts another explanatory variables namely the share of primary commodity exports (PCC) as its third explanatory variable. Meanwhile, the instability index is used as the dependent variable where it is defined as annual percentage rate of change in the value of exports. It is measured according to major (IMajor), non-manufactured (INManu), manufactured (IManu) and total (ITotal). links of london bracelets The commodity concentration index is disaggregated into major (CMajor), non-manufacuted (CNManu), manufactured (CManu) and total (CTotal). This is done to identify the importance of a particular type of commodity concentration that is capable of explaining instability quite significantly. The geographic concentration is also measured at three levels; 5 percent, 1 percent and 0.3 percent as delineated above.

In terms of time series analysis, Wilson (1994) investigated the export earnings instability of Singapore from 1957 to 1988. His findings revealed that there was a high level of instability in the mid 1960s due to political and economic uncertainty in Singapore and instability from 1972 to 1988 was due to shocks from the international economy. economy with links of london necklaces Nevertheless the problem of export fluctuations did not appear to be serious given her record of rapid development growth which had largely insulates her from the negative effects of instability. In a related work, Yeats (1998) reported that studies have shown that countries with highly concentrated exports may experience a relatively high degree of export earning instability that could reduce a country's ability to maintain the financial commitment required by regional arrangements. discount links of london

It is generally agreed that countries specialize in a narrow group of export products exposed themselves to volatility or instability of export earnings (Samen, 2006). links of london bracelets The experience of Least Developed Countries such as Bangladesh, Myanmar and Nepal which had adopted export-oriented policies in the late 1980s initially showed a rapid rate of export growth. However, due to the over-reliance on a narrow group of export products, these countries experienced a slower and even a declined rate of export growth (United Nations, 2004). The dismal performance of several Latin America countries in the 1980s which had implemented inward-oriented policies provided evidence that export diversification and economic development were related. However, Chile is an exception and at odds with the slow-growing Latin American economies. links of london bangles It has managed to mitigate the effects of instability and minimize the volatility of its exports portfolio by developing a relatively significant and more diversified export sector (Luders, 2006). According to Amin Guti.rrez de Pineres and Ferrantino (1997), the main source of diversification in Chile has been the emergence of primary products industries under the inducement of real exchange rate depreciation. As a result, these diversified exports have become the engine of growth for Chile.

Massell (1964) also came up with some interesting findings by concluding that there was a clear relationship between instability of export earnings and concentration of exports. Sweetie Bracelet  But he stressed that "neither diversification nor the degree of industrialization appears to explain much of the variation in export instability", and elaborated further that "diversification may be beneficial in other ways, for example, in providing the economy with greater flexibility in adapting the structure of its production to changes in market conditions"(Massell, 1964, p.62). links of london sweetie bracelet Another cross sectional analysis conducted by Soutar (1977) concluded that geographic concentration was one of the significant variables in explaining instability in 48 less developed countries from 1957 to 1969. Other significant explanatory variables that explained export instability were commodity concentration and petroleum product index. However, Malaysia was excluded in the sample used in this analysis. links of london  Perhaps the main reason Malaysia had to be dropped from the sample was due to lack of data for the period of study. links of london charms  Macbean and Nguyen (1988) showed a summary of cross country results on effects of export instability on economic growth done by 13 authors. These results suggested that instability was an obstacle to growth, but the authors cautioned the readers on the causal relationship between growth and instability was sensitive to the samples of countries, periods of time series and the way in which the instability was measured. Love (1990) in his studies took a sample of 65 developing countries and compared the degrees of instability experiences by this group between the periods of 1960 to 1971 and 1972 to 1984. The results obtained indicated that instability increased between the two periods. It is important to note that Malaysia was one of the seven countries omitted in his studies due to increasing dependency on export revenues from oil.

The objective of the paper is not to challenge the 'if' question - whether output growth eventually reaches the poor - but to provide some evidence on the 'when' and the 'how' output growth can reduce poverty. The contribution to the 'when' question is given by focusing on the short-term defined as a one year period. links of london necklaces The short term should be of interest for the study of poverty. The poor live shorter lives and they are typically afflicted by problems that require urgent solutions such as hunger, maternal and child mortality or fatal diseases. A rapid impact of growth on poverty can save lives and poverty reduction strategies should give great emphasis to this aspect. The contribution to the 'how' question is given by conducting a cross-regional dynamic analysis of growth and poverty in one country combining macro and micro data to better understand the mechanics that link output growth to poverty reduction. discount links of london

The country of choice is Kazakhstan between 2001 and 2002. This is a good natural experiment. Between 1999 and 2002, Kazakhstan enjoyed a period of extraordinary growth estimated at 9.8% between 1999 and 2000, 13.5% between 2000 and 2001 and 9.5% between 2001 and 2002. During the same period, poverty (headcount index) declined significantly from 39% to 24% (World Bank 2004). This led observers to conclude that output growth in this country has been responsible for reducing poverty. Findings are surprising and counter intuitive. links of london bracelets  Despite the strong covariance between output growth and poverty at the national level, we find no evidence of this covariance or a clear causal link between GDP growth and poverty reduction across the regions of Kazakhstan. Output growth has trickled down to households very little with an average growth in household income of only 0.7% between 2001 and 2002. However, the distribution of such growth has been largely pro-poor explaining the observed reduction in poverty. Therefore, the distribution of household income growth rather than output growth explains poverty reduction. links of london bangles