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Water is the most significant natural resource. There is no life without water. Throughout the history, relation to water has been changed, during which water, first seen only as a natural resource, has also become an economic good. Depending on the type of water in consumption, it can be comprehended as an absolute public asset, a public asset or a private property. Water managements goal is to attain the efficiency in water services, through which the quality and the quantity of water is being changed, in order to satisfy the consumers (population, agriculture and industry). The creation of necessary conditions, such as income achievement through taxes and atonement, provide both public and private water consumption. In the view of the fact that water management is an infrastructural activity, it ought to be tailored in the accordance with transitional processes. The important task of water management is the integration of EU WFD, especially in handling river basins.

This publication consists of seven chapters: building a system for public investment management; a unified framework for public investment management; country experiences of public investment management; approaches to better project appraisal; public investment management under uncertainty; procurement and public investment management; and public investment management for public-private partnerships.

The study of the features of auditing the effectiveness of asset management in the activities of external state audit bodies is highly relevant, as it helps to increase transparency and responsibility in the management of public resources. This is especially important in conditions where the public demands more open and honest activities of government authorities. The analysis carried out in the tourism industry allowed us to identify areas in which costs can be reduced and expenses optimized, which is important for the effective management of limited budgetary resources, and also emphasizes the importance of studying the specifics of auditing efficiency of asset management in the activities of external government audit bodies for both developed countries and developing economies, including Kazakhstan. The purpose of the study is to develop an understanding and identify key aspects of auditing the effectiveness of asset management of external state audit bodies in the tourism industry in order to increase transparency, responsibility and efficiency in the use of public assets, aimed at analyzing existing practices, theoretical concepts both in Kazakhstan and beyond limits, providing more effective management and increased oversight of their use.

In its famous PSPP judgment, the German Federal Constitutional Court activated for the first time its ultra vires doctrine and declared that both the Secondary Markets Public Sector Asset Purchase Programme of the Europe-an Central Bank and its interpretation by the CJEU violated the proportionality requirements by not examining in a comprehensive and substantiated manner the economic policy effects that its practical implementation inevitably entails. However, this judgment is based on a manifestly erroneous interpretation of the relationship be-tween the principles of proportionality and conferral and constitutes a concealed attempt to redefine the methods of interpretation of EU law and to impose the traditional perception of the constitutional court about the role of central banking and the existence of an absolute and inviolable separation between monetary and economic policy. At the same time, the constitutional court breaks its promise to exercise its ultra vires review in a cooperative spirit and fails to exhaust the institutional means that were available to it in order to resolve the matter in a legally appropriate and amicable manner that would not essentially amount to a precarious attempt to adjudicate economics.

In a context of dwindling resources and growing financial constraints for public administrations, available real estate assets can become an important economic resource both for debt reduction through their alienation, and for carrying out public works through rehabilitation and defunctionalisation using private capital. The latter requires the adoption of innovative policies and strategies to enhance the value of the assets, especially those that are disused or abandoned, which very often represent a critical element in the overall management of public administrations. This study proposes a strategy for the enhancement of public assets using a little-experimented contractual form of public–private partnership. This approach, through a complex exchange transaction, avoids the total disposal of the assets, thus guaranteeing the social and environmental sustainability of the intervention, and also allows for the enhancement of the property with a financially convenient solution for both partners. The balance between the benefits of the two parties is in fact the basis of the model proposed for the final solution.

The debate on public real estate enhancement is prominent and requires innovative strategies to assure economic and social sustainability. This article aims at systematizing the currently available methods and tools of public property enhancement in Italy, proposing a system of criteria to support the public administration (PA) in the decision-making process when managing public real estate enhancement oriented towards public utility. Namely, this article considers and assesses consolidated and innovative public real estate enhancement methods and tools currently available to the Italian PA according to the “endogenous criteria” of the real estate tools and “criteria of purpose” of the public administration promoting the enhancement process. The final aim is to support the decision-making process of PAs and help both public and private actors in grasping and managing the complexity of public real estate enhancement. An overview of the literature and of reference laws on public property enhancement builds the research framework, together with a path of research, dialogues, and fieldworks with the Italian State Property Agency (Agenzia del Demanio). The decision-making process of PAs for selecting a suitable enhancement strategy or tool should rest on endogenous criteria and criteria of purpose. Specifically: (i) the distinct technical features of each public asset; (ii) the public utility aim that the public entity intends to pursue; (iii) the needs of the community (i.e., the demand); (iv) the skills available within the PA that promotes the strategy.

This paper deals with private sponsorship as a tool for the redevelopment of Italy’s vast wealth of historical-architectural public heritage sites. Italian law provides for the stipulation of sponsorship agreements by and between public sector agencies or entities (which need financial resources to restore or re-qualify property) and private sector investors (which guarantee the capital sought by the public sector in exchange for significant returns on their investments) raising various economic issues, particularly in connection with the profitability thresholds for private sector investors in return for the public sector’s use of their financial resources. In this paper, the authors focus on how private sector investors determine how much of their businesses turnover constitutes the optimal percentage level of overall income that may be invested in sponsorships to maximize business profitability. For this purpose, a model based on past works on the subject (Bucci et al., 2003) has been chosen by the authors. Such model gives a solution for verifying a sponsorship’s profitability. This model is static and is applicable to single-product companies that invest in sponsorships, under the theories of monopolistic competition and of Cobb-Douglas production function. Our objectives are to present this model, explaining in detail the mathematical steps, simplifying the model where possible in order to reduce the levels of complexity in its application, and finally to apply it to real case scenarios of cultural sponsorships.

There are significant economic gains to be realized if the East Africa sub region improves the overall integration of its markets. But infrastructure development that links markets across countries faces particular challenges, political, institutional, and economic. In the case of East Africa, these challenges have served to hold back investment into regional infrastructure, despite significant recent efforts within the region to develop regional infrastructure investment plans and promote an increased use of Public-Private Partnership (PPP) approaches to mobilize private sector financing and expertise. The report also recommends funding options for regional PPPs. The two main products identified are a Viability Gap Facility (VGF), which would bridge the gap between the commercial viability of a regional PPP and its economic viability; and a Project Development Facility (PDF), which could support the preparation costs of regional PPPs. The VGF could potentially be linked to the EAC Development Fund. Partner States need to be aware when designing these products that they may compete for funds with domestic financing needs. The report also considers the desirability of a regional long-term debt facility, and while there is widespread recognition of the need for longer-term local currency financing, the challenges involved in implementing such a facility are such that this will need to be revisited at a future date.

Long-duration energy storage (LDES) can deliver system-wide flexibility and decarbonization benefits, yet investment is often hindered because these benefits are diffuse and not fully monetized under conventional market structures. A public-asset-oriented valuation and cost-allocation framework is proposed for LDES. First, LDES externality benefits are quantified through a system-level optimization-based simulation on a stylized aggregated regional network, with key indicators including thermal generation cost, carbon penalty, renewable curtailment cost, involuntary load shedding, and end-user electricity expenditures. Second, LDES investment costs are allocated among thermal generators, renewable operators, grid entities, and end users via a benefit-based Nash bargaining mechanism. In the case study, introducing LDES reduces thermal generation cost by 3.92%, carbon penalties by 5.59%, and renewable curtailment expenditures by 7.07%, while eliminating load shedding. The resulting cost shares are 46.9% (renewables), 28.7% (end users), 22.4% (thermal generation), and 0.5% (grid entity), consistent with stakeholder-specific benefit distributions. Sensitivity analyses across storage capacity and placement further show diminishing marginal returns beyond near-optimal sizing and systematic shifts in cost responsibility as benefit patterns change. Overall, this framework offers a scalable, economically efficient, and equitable strategy for cost redistribution, supporting accelerated LDES adoption in future low-carbon power systems.

The global financial crisis has reignited interest in counter-cyclical fiscal policy as a critical instrument to provide immediate economic stimulus. But policy makers are also increasingly interested in how fiscal policy will impact growth and poverty over a longer run horizon, knowing that any quick responses to exogenous shocks also affect income generation and distribution. Those effects are less well known, however, and their dynamics still represent a challenge for many countries. In this book the authors explore methodological advances and new practices for fiscal policy implementation with a particular focus on developing countries. They also attempt to draw preliminary lessons from the global crisis and the still persisting uncertainty about future growth prospects. The crisis has brought into question many economic concepts, policies, and implementation practices that economists supported in previous decades. Counter-cyclical fiscal policy has suddenly returned to prominence worldwide either in conjunction with or in lieu of monetary policy and exchange rate adjustments, as a possible alternative in response to the unexpected and acute shocks that the crisis has brought about. These experiences are providing valuable lessons about the design and effectiveness of fiscal policy measures in developing countries, which is the focus of this volume. Since focusing entirely on the temporary effects of the crisis would mask the bigger challenges underlying the conduct of fiscal policy, particularly in countries where longer term growth patterns remain sluggish or volatile, and poverty and inequality still persist, the authors adopt a broader perspective trying to better understand the dynamics of longer term effects. The purpose of this book is precisely to improve our understanding of the challenges and possible innovative solutions in implementing fiscal policy for growth and welfare purposes, taking into account that crises do occur and will continue occurring, affecting previous growth and inequality paths. The authors present an analysis of some of the trade offs and policy choices that developing countries face, in light of the recent crisis. From expenditure composition to benefit incidence analysis, passing through the difficulties of improving public investment management, the authors consider a whole range of methodological advances and new practices that could enlighten practitioners in designing fiscal policy packages appropriate to the reality of their own countries. A special chapter is dedicated to African countries and a final section highlights some of the remaining topics for future research, together with data and other pertinent issues.