Economic Evaluation of Investment Projects: Possibilities and Problems of Applying Western Methods in China

摘要

This paper, written originally for a Chinese audience, is a simple description of economic cost-benefit analysis, coupled with a discussion of its applicability to project appraisal in China. It is concerned mainly with methods of estimating shadow prices for projects inputs and outputs, particularly in light of the size and non-market nature of China's economy. Most of the exposition is narrowly economic in the sense of assessing a project's impact on the level of national income, without regard to its distribution, but the relevance to China of social evaluation is also discussed, as is the need to combine other criteria with the results of formal economic analysis in making investment decisions. An annotated bibliography is included. (Copyright (c) The World Bank 1984.)