GLOBAL SUBSIDIES INITIATIVE
Subsidy WatchIssue 37, March 2010
Download as PDF: Subsidy Watch, Issue 37, March 2010 (593 KB)
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Cuban government withdraws payments to the unemployed, under intense economic pressure
In the midst of one of the worst economic crises to have hit Cuba since the fall of the Soviet Union, the government of Cuba has been forced to cut back aid provided to workers of the communist state. In particular, the government has announced it will end its policy of providing a guaranteed salary to unemployed workers.
Also in this issue:
Commentary
News
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Fossil-fuel subsidies round-up: February 2010
Following announcements that fossil-fuel subsidies will be phased out, from the G-20, the Asian-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) and a number of independent countries, including Iran, Nigeria and Bahrain, Subsidy Watch has decided each month to highlight important news stories that touch on this theme …
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Will budget deficits provide leverage for farm subsidy reform?
According to a recent analysis by farmsubsidy.org, in order to understand how the EU establishes its budget it is first necessary to appreciate the different characters and priorities of the EU's Member states.
Studies
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Lessons learned reforming Polish coal subsidies
Lessons learned from the restructuring of Poland’s coal-mining industry, written by Professor Wojciech Suwala of the Mineral and Energy Economy Research Institute, analyses how the reform of subsidies to coal mining was conducted as Poland moved from a centrally planned to a market economy.
The report describes in detail the various stages in the reform process and the annual spending on each form of compensatory measure: in total around US$ 9.3 billion between 1990 and 2006, the most substantial spending having been dedicated to social programs for workers.
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IMF call for fossil-fuel subsidy reform
In February, the International Monetary Foundation released a Staff Position Note on the size and impact of fossil-fuel subsidies, and the need for their reform, Petroleum Product Subsidies: Costly, Inequitable, and Rising.
The report notes that as fossil-fuel prices continue to increase, so will the fiscal burden on subsidizing states. It estimates that in 2010 the global value of fossil-fuel subsidies will be either US$ 250 or US$ 740 billion, depending on the method of estimation.
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Methods for subsidy identification and assessment tested by the IEEP
A number of subsidy identification and analysis tools developed by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) have been road-tested by the Institute for European Environmental Policy (IEEP), in a report published November last year called Environmentally Harmful Subsidies: Identification and Assessment.
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VTPI says save money by raising public transport taxes
In February, the Victoria Transport Policy Institute (VTPI) published a report which argues that urban households in the United States could save money overall if taxes were raised to pay for better public transport.
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United States’ renewable-energy support programs catalogued
At an impressive 834 pages, Renewable Energy Government Incentive Programs, released in February by Energy Business Reports (EBR), offers an in-depth look at the United States’ many programs supporting renewable energy.
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GSI policy brief: subsidies for anti-malarial treatments
The Global Subsidies Initiative has released the latest in its series of policy briefs, an analysis of the Global Fund's 'Affordable Medicines Facility - malaria', or AMFm, a program designed to make costly malaria treatments affordable across the world, at the same time as aiming to avoid the negative impacts often caused by subsidies.
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Diminishing Expectations: Broken Promises in the Development of Cellulosic Ethanol Production
By Robert Rapier
The United States' Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently acknowledged that, despite generous levels of taxpayer funding, cellulosic ethanol was not scaling up as quickly as they had hoped. So they reduced the 2010 cellulosic ethanol mandate from 100 million gallons to 6.5 million gallons. The basis for their decision was contained in a published update to the Renewable Fuel Standards Program.
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