MPO




MPO - Root Cause


Macroeconomic Reforms in Southern Africa

The overarching objective of this project is to build capacity in four countries of southern Africa to ensure that environmental issues are integrated into the design and implementation of their respective macroeconomic programs.

The Macroeconomics for Sustainable Development Program Office (MPO) has in two previous studies analyzed the environmental impacts of economic instruments on a national level. These studies, carried out in Asia, Africa, and Latin America, documented direct links between macroeconomic polices and sustainable development. In collaboration with the donor community, the MPO has developed this project, which is seeking new approaches to structural reforms through implementation of alternative policies.

The overall objective of the project is to implement economic reforms in South Africa, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe that integrates economic, environmental and social issues, and that will benefit the poorest section of the population. The project objec tive is to enhance the capacity of policy makers and stakeholders to integrate environmental issues into macroeconomic reform programs. A second objective is to work with Government Aid Agencies (GAA) to develop approaches to structural reforms which prom ote environmental sustainability and poverty alleviation.

The Program is funded by WWF, EC, Sida, CIDA, DANIDA, BMZ, and SDC.

---Published in 1992 (Structural Adjustment and the Environment) and 1995 (Structural Adjustment, the Environment and Sustainable Development), two comprehensive MPO studies have documented the direct link between economic reform programs and environmental problems in a range of developing countries.


Additional Pages

  • Background
  • Activities
  • Target audiences and partners


    For further information, please contact:
    MPO
    Email: MPO@wwfus.org







  • Thailand: economic gain - environmental loss

    Following macroeconomic reforms in the early 1980s, the Thai economy experienced unprecedented growth - as measured by traditional economic indicators. But ignoring the social and environmental dimensions of structural adjustment had an unexpectedly high price. The reforms did little to improve the standard of living of the rural poor, who began to protest. In response, the government sought not to address the underlying issue of social inequality, but to appease the protest by allowing farmers to extend cultivation into vulnerable forest reserves in northeastern Thailand. The ensuing deforestation resulted in extensive flooding several years later, damage that ultimately entailed very high economic as well as environmental costs.