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This book is a rich addition to the existing knowledge on models of development partnership among developing countries. Unlike the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), which exclusively focuses on physical infrastructure development with a strong financing component by China, the Asia–Africa Growth Corridor (AAGC) envisages a holistic approach toward development partnership based on the spirit of triangular cooperation, demystifying the donor-recipient model of development cooperation. By integrating four distinct pillars of cooperation – connectivity and physical infrastructure, capacity building and skill development, development cooperation projects, and people-to-people and business-to-business partnerships – the book provides a succinct account of how a demand-driven people-centric model of engagement among Asian and African countries could help achieve inclusive and sustainable development without creating any fatal dependence on specific countries or institutions for external funding. In sixteen chapters, the book covers various theoretical, analytical, and policy discussions with respect to the concept and modalities of the growth corridor approach under the free, open, and inclusive Indo-Pacific; potential opportunities and challenges in economic sectors and fields like agriculture, manufacturing, trade and investment, urbanization, industrialization, human resource development, and the blue economy; social sector priorities including health, education, skill development, disaster management, and women's participation; and policy issues relating to trade facilitation, the identification of joint projects, modalities and instruments of project execution, and related aspects. The book offers a valuable resource for students and research scholars working in the fields of development economics, development cooperation, international political economy, and international economic relations. It also serves as a handbook for governments and policymakers on issues concerning the suitability of development projects, sources of and innovations in financing, implementation and execution challenges, private sector involvement, and so on.

This book traces regional income inequality in Spain during the transition from a pre-industrial society to a modern economy, using the Spanish case to shed further light on the challenges that emerging economies are facing today. Regional inequality is currently one of the most pressing problems in the European Union, and this text presents a novel dataset covering 150 years to analyse long-run trends in regional per capita GDP.Spatial clustering and a new economic geography approach also contribute to the historical analysis provided, which points to the role played by spatial externalities and their growing relevance over time. To identify the presence of spatial dependence is crucial, not only for getting a better understanding of distribution dynamics, but also for economic policy purposes.What are the potential causes behind the disparities in regional per capita income and productivity? The authors answer this by comparing results with evidence available for othercountries, chiefly France, Italy and Portugal, but is of global relevance.