Place Based Economic Development with Simon White

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Simon White

Simon White

Simon White is a specialist in place-based economic development, private sector and business development and business environment reform.

European Support for the Private Sector in Achieving Inclusive and Sustainable Growth in Developing Countries

The month, the European Commission submitted a report to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of Regions on its support to the private sector in developing countries, The report, entitled A Stronger Role of the Private Sector in Achieving Inclusive and Sustainable

Arguments on Africa de-industrialisation

It’s been interesting to observe the range of arguments surrounding the topic of “Africa’s de-industralisation”. These range from whether or not Africa is indeed de-industralising, to how best to re-industrialise. Within these discussions there are interesting debates on the role of small and medium enterprises (SMEs), the importance

Creating public-private partnerships in Agriculture

Today, I met with the senior management team of the African Fertilizer and Agribusiness Partnership (AFAP) in Johannesburg, South Africa. This non-for-profit organisation facilitates linkages between private and public actors to build markets in the agriculture sector –– specifically in fertilisers. It does this so that African smallholder farmers can grow

Ethnic power sharing in Africa

In a new paper titled, “How Is Power Shared In Africa?”, Patrick Francois, Ilia Rainer, and Francesco Trebbi examine the role of ethnic elites. They investigate the ethnicity of cabinet ministers since independence (Benin, Cameroon, Cote d’Ivoire, Democratic Republic of Congo, Gabon, Ghana, Guinea, Kenya, Liberia, Nigeria, Republic of

Second Global Seminar on Results Measurement

Last month, the Donor Committee for Enterprise Development (DCED) held its second Global Seminar on Results Measurement in Bangkok. The seminar featured the experiences of ten field programmes that have used the DCED Standard for Results Measurement. It also looked at cross-cutting themes, such as what we have learned to

Regulatory reform - deregulation versus better regulation

Simon White | This article argues for better regulation rather than simply less regulation.

Jobs created by "everyday businesses"

Last year I posted a discussion on this site about the so-called “growth-oriented” enterprises and questioned whether policy makers are able to identify these firms before they grow. This topic has recently been revisited by the UK-based RSA (Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce) in a