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Abstract
The World Bank's commodity price projections are widely used for various planning purposes. Two
aspects of the Bank's projections of relative prices are studied in this paper. The first is whether the
forecasts make efficient use of the information available at the time the forecast is made. The second
JS whether the forecasts predict future prices with greater accuracy than alternative forecasting methods.
These matters are studied by comparing the World Bank's past price projections with the actual
prices that were subsequently observed. The results show that, overall, the World Bank forecasts do
not pass either test. First, the World Bank forecasts are informationally inefficient. Prediction error
(projection minus actual price) tends to be positively correlated with the projections themselves.
Although the direction of future price movements tends to be correctly predicted, the magnitude of
these movements tends to be overpredicted. Second, the World Bank forecasts do not perform well
even compared with the simplest of alternative forecasting methods - the prediction of no change.