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Egypt has been unable to sustain rapid economic growth in the past, nor has it been able to generate employment opportunities at a fast enough rate to keep unemployment from rising. It will be argued in this paper that this has been the result of significant implicit taxation of the agricultural sector. The latter has slowed the structural transformation of the Egyptian economy, increased the capital intensity of production in the urban sector, and slowed overall economic growth. The Egyptian experience is contrasted with that of South Korea and Taiwan. The results indicate that indeed structural change in Egypt has been slowed by the implicit taxation of agriculture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Distances involved in accessing basic services can constitute a major barrier to development. This paper analyzes the relationship between the distance separating households from microfinance institutions' offices in Niger, and the low levels of development and performance of the microfinance sector in the country. To cope with the effects of geographical distance, microfinance institutions adapt their policies through more restrictive loan conditions, higher interest rates and more intensive screening. This then leads us to discuss the tension between access and sustainability in the context of financial services for the poor. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the 1990s, studies utilizing descriptive statistics have documented factors in the business environment, which hinder the performance of Ugandan micro and small enterprises (MSEs). Based on secondary data, this paper assesses the trend of critical factors since 1994 to 2010. The paper also utilizes the primary data from MSEs to examine the effects of these factors on the growth potential of MSEs, while controlling for the owner's and the firm's attributes. Results from the trend analysis reveal that the business environment has been deteriorating over time. Results from the regression analyses reveal that MSEs' growth potential is negatively associated with limited access to productive resources, high taxes and lack of market access. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite a decade of rapid economic growth, Africa's industrial sector remains underdeveloped. In this paper we explain why improved economic performance in the industrial sector is important for Africa's long-term growth, and discuss the prospects for accelerated industrialization on the continent. We distinguish between macroeconomic aspects, factors related to the investment climate, and the role of skills at the level of the enterprise. We also discuss the theoretical underpinnings of industrial policy, as well as implementation problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the effects of market-based financial sector reforms on the competitiveness and efficiency of commercial banks, and economic growth, in Zambia. The results show that reforms adopted in Phase II (strengthening of regulatory and supervisory, payments and settlements, and financial operations frameworks) and Phase III (implementation of a comprehensive financial sector development plan) had significant positive effects on bank cost efficiency. Macroeconomic variables such as per capita GDP and inflation were insignificant. Further, using an endogenous growth model in which industrial production is a proxy for GDP growth, it was found that bank cost efficiency, financial depth, Phase II and III financial sector reforms, the degree of economic openness, and rate of inflation were significant determinants of economic growth. Phase II policies and the inflation rate have negative effects while the rest of the variables have positive effects on economic growth. Some plausible policy lessons are offered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the last thirty years, remarkable achievements have been made in China's poverty reduction course. The dramatic fall in China's poor can be attributed mainly to a high rate of economic growth, government poverty reduction policies and targeted programmes and pro-poor macroeconomic and industrial policies. This paper focuses on China's poverty reduction policies and programmes and their impact on the poor regions and poor households. Lessons are drawn for poverty reduction and economic development in African countries. The paper also explores the potential for collaboration in poverty reduction between China and African countries and recommendations are made for the governments and donor agencies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a brief account of welfare changes in Zimbabwe along the income and education dimensions between 1995 and 2003. Using sequential dominance procedures, we find that education attainment substantially improved over time. However, these gains did not necessarily translate into poverty reduction, rather welfare over the joint distribution of income and education dramatically deteriorated. These results are robust for all education partitions, income thresholds and a broad class of welfare indices. A further inquiry into the factors underlying this apparent disconnection between education and income using decomposition techniques reveals that the increase in poverty incidence cannot be attributed to household characteristics but is reflective of the broader socio-economic trends prevailing at the time. The decline in economic growth contributed tremendously to the decline in welfare while inequality changes account for a small proportion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to investigate the complementary relationship between commercial banks and microfinance institutions in the West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU) as a means to sustain economic growth. Using panel data on seven countries from 1999 to 2005 with the Feasible Generalized Least Squares and the AR(1) disturbances, the study indicates that the banking and microfinance sectors are prone to operating individually, and that banks benefit from microfinance activities. A joint effort of both sectors in facing credit allocation appears to be very significant over the single action of microfinance institutions. The study, therefore, suggests a joint or complementary approach through savings management to face the challenge of the economic growth in the Union. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses the bias-corrected least-squares dummy variable (LSDV) estimator to examine the relationship between economic growth and four different types of private capital inflows (cross-border bank lending, foreign direct investment (FDI), bonds flows and portfolio equity flows) on a sample of 15 selected sub-Saharan African countries over the period 1980–2008. Our results show that FDI and cross-border bank lending exert a significant and positive impact on sub-Saharan Africa's growth, whereas portfolio equity flows and bonds flows have no growth impact. Our estimates suggest that a drop by 10 per cent in FDI inflows may lead to a 3 per cent decrease of income per capita growth in sub-Saharan Africa, and a 10 per cent decrease in cross-border bank lending may reduce growth by up to 1.5 per cent. Therefore, the global financial crisis is likely to have an important effect on sub-Saharan Africa's growth through the private capital inflows channel. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the dynamic impact of interest rate reforms on economic growth in Zambia—using two models in a stepwise fashion. In the first model, the efficacy of interest rate liberalization is examined by regressing the interest rate on the level of financial deepening. In the second model, the causal relationship between financial depth and economic growth is examined by incorporating savings as an intermittent variable in the bivariate setting, thereby creating a simple trivariate model. Using the cointegration-based error correction model, the study finds strong support for the positive impact of interest rate liberalization on financial deepening. In addition, the study finds that financial deepening, which results from interest rate liberalization, Granger causes economic growth. The results apply irrespective of whether the causality is estimated in the short run or in the long run. Other results show that: (1) lagged financial depth leads to further financial deepening; (2) savings and economic growth Granger cause each other; and (3) financial development Granger causes savings in the long run. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses 1974 to 2001 panel data for 31 sub-Saharan African and 10 Arab countries and Arellano–Bond estimations to empirically assess the impact on growth of an important indicator associated with MDG 3; namely the ratio of 15–24-year-old literate females to males. Our findings indicate that gender inequalities in literacy have a statistically significant negative effect that is robust to changes in the specification. In addition, it seems that gender inequality has a stronger effect on growth in Arab countries. Interestingly, we find that the interaction between openness to trade and gender inequality has a positive impact. This result suggests that trade-induced growth may be accompanied by greater gender inequalities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to estimate the productivity change of Nigerian insurance companies and to rank the companies analysed in the sample according to their productivity score. This benchmark exercise provides the companies analysed with a view of how their relative productivity can be upgraded. For this purpose, the non-parametric Luenberger productivity model is used. For comparative purposes, the non-parametric Luenberger–Hicks–Moorsteen productivity indicator is also used. The companies are ranked according to their total productivity for the period 1994–2005, using both models, which produce variations in the respective results. Economic implications arising from the study are derived. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper conducts an empirical investigation into the effects of financial liberalization policies on the growth of 19 countries in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Two indexes are constructed which measure the gradual progression and institutional changes involved in financial liberalization. Because these indexes track specific financial liberalization policies, they provide better measures of financial liberalization than the indicators of financial development often used in the literature. Panel data estimates show a significant positive relationship between economic growth and financial liberalization policies. Our results are robust to alternative specifications of the model, and also across slow- and fast-growing countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the possible effects of the US reform of the international settlement rate system on telecommunications investment in Africa. We estimate a telecommunications investment equation using a panel data of 51 African countries during the 1991–2003 period and find that settlement payments have significantly positive effects on telecommunications investment in African countries. A 10 percent increase in settlement payment, on average, increases the telecommunications investment expenditure to GDP ratio by 3.4 percent over a three-year period. Using previously calculated revenue loss from the US reform, our estimates suggest that African countries stand to lose between 4.4 to 11 percentage points of their telecommunications investment in the medium run and with it, possible decreases in income growth rate. However, we argue that African countries can counter the effects of this revenue loss by increasing the efficiency of telecommunications investment through appropriate market restructuring, including the promotion of competition and privatization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides an overview of how African labour markets have performed in the 1990s. It is argued that the failure of African labour markets to create good paying jobs has resulted in excess labour supply in the form of either open unemployment or a growing self-employment sector. One explanation for this outcome is a lack of labour market ‘flexibility’ keeping formal sector wages above their equilibrium level and restricting job creation. We identify three attributes of labour market flexibility. First, whether real wages decline over time; secondly, the tendency for wages to adjust in the face of unemployment; and thirdly, the extent of wage differentials between sectors and/or firms of various size. Recent research shows that real wages in Africa during the 1990s may have been more downwardly flexible than previously thought and have been surprisingly responsive to unemployment rates, yet large wage differentials between formal and informal sector firms remain. This third sense of the term ‘inflexibility’ can explain a common factor across diverse African economies — the high income divide between those working in large firms and those not. Those working in the thriving self-employment sector in Ghana have something in common with the unemployed in South Africa — both have very low income opportunities relative to those in large firms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper uses the Poverty Analysis Macroeconomic Simulator (PAMS), a World Bank framework and updates its interface with the Cameroon government macroeconomic framework to analyze the potential impact of the implementation of the HIPC initiative on poverty alleviation. According to the main findings, it is very likely that Cameroon would succeed in achieving the poverty Millennium Development Goal. However, this result would be feasible if and only if the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP) is fully implemented. That is not very certain because of the failure already observed during the first year of PRSP implementation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper it is argued that political development is the key to long-run growth in developing nations. Political development is seen to be dependent on the extent to which a state or ruling elite's income is earned or unearned. The availability of earned income is linked to the structure and productivity of the agricultural sector. Applying the analysis to the sub-Saharan African experience involves taking into account three factors: the international environment, the ethnic division of societies as a result of colonization, and the urban bias which characterized the economic strategy of the newly independent African states. As a result, agriculture collapsed, the ruling elite became increasingly dependent on unearned income, political underdevelopment occurred. The collapse of state authority significantly impoverished the region and resulted in significant civil conflict. Any long-run solution must incorporate a broad-based expansion in agricultural productivity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Academic research often claims that the lack of technical capability undermines Africa's economic growth. Policy decisions based on that claim then recommend technological improvement, where technology is generally treated as a homogenous manna from the heaven. This paper outlines four, and calculates two, broad indices of the diversity of technical capability of 14 African countries based on nine common descriptors of technical capability. It finds technical capability to be heterogeneous both within and across countries, and concludes that performance policies that overlook diversity of technical capability are potentially misleading, ineffective, and perhaps even damaging (growth retarding). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the trend, constraints, promotion, and prospects of investment – domestic investment, foreign direct investment, and private portfolio investment – in Africa. After identifying the importance of investment in Africa's economic development, it was shown that all forms of investment are low in Africa and hence inadequate for the attainment of the MDGs and poverty reduction in the continent. The constraining factors include: low resources mobilization; high degree of uncertainty; poor governance, corruption, and low human capital development; unfavorable regulatory environment and poor infrastructure, small individual country sizes; high dependence on primary commodities exports and increased competition; poor image abroad; shortage of foreign exchange and the burden of huge domestic and external debt; and undeveloped capital markets, their high volatility, and home bias by foreign investors. The paper recommends that successful promotion of both domestic, foreign direct and portfolio investment in Africa will require actions and measures at the national, regional, and international levels. It concludes that the prospects are bright. New and attractive investment opportunities are emerging in infrastructure, particularly as most African countries now encourage public/private partnerships for investments in this sector. In addition to privatization, renewed interest within Africa in undertaking regionally based projects and joint exploitation of natural resources is creating other investment opportunities. Apart from the fact that investment in Africa yields the highest returns, investment risk in the continent is declining. In addition, much progress has been made in recent years to improve the investment climate in Africa. All this is of course is not to deny that obstacles do remain hence economic reforms to enhance domestic investment would need to be complemented by measures to attract increased foreign capital. Critical in such endeavors must be efforts to improve governance in some countries as well as to eliminate socio-political violence in others and development of domestic capital markets, while government institutions must be modernized and upgraded. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies the effect of stock market development on economic growth in 14 African countries in a dynamic panel data modelling setting. Results largely show a positive relationship between stock market development and economic growth. Further analyses, based on the level of economic development and stock market capitalization, are also conducted. The results reveal that the positive influence of stock market development on economic growth is significant for countries classified as upper middle income economies. On the basis of market capitalization groupings, stock market developments play a significant role in growth only for moderately capitalized markets. The general trend in results shows that low income African countries and less developed stock markets need to grow more and develop their markets to elicit economic gains from stock markets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of African Development Review / Revue Africaine de Développement is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of African Development Review / Revue Africaine de Développement is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of African Development Review / Revue Africaine de Développement is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of African Development Review / Revue Africaine de Développement is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of African Development Review / Revue Africaine de Développement is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper utilizes cointegration and the vector error-correction model (VECM) to explore the causal relationship between economic growth and growth rate of domestic savings for Congo, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Kenya, South Africa, and Zambia. Specifically, three analyses were undertaken. First, the time series properties of economic growth and domestic savings were ascertained with the help of the augmented Dickey–Fuller unit root procedure. Second, the long-run relationship between economic growth and growth rate of domestic savings was examined in the context of the Johansen and Juselius (1990) framework. Finally, a Granger-causality test was undertaken to determine the direction of causality between economic growth and growth rate of domestic savings. The results indicate one order of integration [I(1)] for each of the series. The results of the cointegration tests suggest that there is a long-run relationship between economic growth and growth rate of savings. The results from the Granger-causality tests indicate that contrary to the conventional wisdom, economic growth prima facie causes growth rate of domestic savings for most of the countries under consideration. Le présent document utilise la co-intégration et le modèle à vecteur de correction des erreurs (VECM) pour étudier les relations de cause à effet entre la croissance économique et les taux de croissance de l’épargne intérieure au Congo, en Côte d’Ivoire, au Ghana, au Kenya, en Afrique du Sud et en Zambie. Plus précisément, trois analyses ont été effectuées. La première a vérifié les propriétés des séries chronologiques de la croissance économique et de l’épargne intérieure à l’aide de la méthode Dickey–Fuller de racine unitaire augmentée. La deuxième a examiné les relations à long terme entre ... [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of African Development Review / Revue Africaine de Développement is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The slow growth of Algeria is analyzed in this paper, by comparing the economic growth between Algeria and South Korea, over the period from 1970 to 2010. Both countries were nearly at the same development level at the beginning of the 1960s. Nevertheless, the South Korean economy was ranked 15th in the world in 2010, while Algeria remained underdeveloped. The results obtained show that human capital and physical capital cause the economic growth in the two countries under study. However, the elasticities of productivity with respect to human and physical capital are higher in South Korea. Human capital elasticity in South Korea is two and a half times higher, whereas the physical capital elasticity is twice as high. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To the extent that in utero and childhood malnutrition negatively affects later stage mental and physical health, it can possibly constrain later stage human capital acquisition, which is an important driver of economic growth. This paper considers the impact of famine on aggregate adolescent human capital formation in sub-Saharan Africa. We parameterize a joint adolescent human capital and food nutrition production function to estimate the effects of famine on years of primary school completed by individuals aged 15-19. Mixed fixed and random coefficient parameter estimates for 32 sub-Saharan African countries between 1980 and 2010 reveal that years of primary school completed by adolescents is proportional to the quantity of food and nutrition produced during childhood and in utero. This suggests that declines in food production and nutrition associated with famine in sub-Saharan Africa have large negative effects on the acquisition of human capital by adolescents and on long-run material living standards. Our findings show that there is yet another consequence to famine, a long-run reduction in adolescent human capital, and this should reinforce the case for strong food security programmes in sub-Saharan Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper re-examines the long-run finance-growth nexus in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) using data from 17 countries over the period 1975-2005. We apply error correction-based panel cointegration tests that take into account cross-sectional dependence among countries. Our results - unlike a previous study using the same data - indicate the existence of a long-run relationship between financial and economic development in SSA countries. Moreover, our results clearly show that the long-run causality runs from financial to economic development, although a muted support for the reverse causal impact is observed when financial development is measured by the percentage of liquid liabilities in GDP. The estimated long-run parameters measuring the finance-growth link are positive and statistically significant. Therefore, our results strongly support policies aimed at developing the financial sector in SSA in order to promote long-run economic development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper evaluates the determinants of borrowing, effects of borrowing on economic well-being, and potential disparity in responses by sources of well-being, location and gender, while controlling for other correlates. The 2001 Cameroon household consumption survey and a range of survey-based econometric methods that purge parameter estimates of potential intra-cluster correlation, endogeneity and sample selection biases were used. Access to credit/borrowing is strongly associated with household economic well-being irrespective of source of well-being. Rural well-being is significally more contingent on credit access than urban well-being. Male-headed households rely more significantly on credit access to enhance well-being than their female counterparts. Higher levels of education associate more significantly with well-being enhancement than lower levels, more so for female-headed households than their male counterparts. To sustain the impact of credit on well-being, accompanying measures - availability of sufficient funds, quality services by lenders, physical infrastructures, healthcare and training - are required. These findings are useful in the context of economic recovery and poverty reduction under the current situation in Cameroon, where financial intermediation is limited and penetration is shallow. To better serve the needs of the economically active poor, a microfinance delivery model is proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper empirically investigates the relationship between financial development and economic growth in the North Africa region, using a panel regression and different indicators of financial development. We find that the relation depends on the type of the indicator of financial development. In fact, while both financial institutions and markets in Morocco and Tunisia have a positive effect on the economic growth, only the financial markets in Egypt will improve economic growth by increasing the supply of financial services. For Algeria, the banking system has a positive effect on economic growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Investment is a crucial factor determining economic performance at the firm as well as the country level. In this paper I identify the determinants of the decision to invest in new plant and equipment as well as the determinants of the level of such investment for a sample of firms in 19 sub-Saharan African countries. In particular, I concentrate on the role of property rights, external finance, trade status and firm ownership on investment. Results indicate that internationally trading firms, foreign owned firms and firms with better access to sources of external finance tend to be more likely to invest and to invest more, with little role for indicators of property rights in influencing investment decisions found. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of African Development Review / Revue Africaine de Développement is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper deals with the dynamics of growth in the countries of the Economic and Monetary Community of Central Africa (CEMAC), focusing on external trade, in particular with China. Its aim is to shed light on the increasing influence of China in Africa. It uses dynamic panel estimations to measure the impact of trade orientation on economic growth in the CEMAC countries and concludes that specialization in natural resources affects economic growth negatively. But this effect is somewhat mitigated by the orientation towards China. Moreover, the weak intraregional trade between CEMAC countries has failed to contribute to their economic growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies the emergence of developing countries from a development trap. It shows that countries whose dynamics exhibits several growth peaks can be considered as cases of equilibrium jump. Applying this criterion to a sample of 65 countries that were initially very poor in 1950, it identifies 13 such countries, called 'emerging economies'. Comparing emerging and non-emerging economies in the 1950s and early 1960s, it shows that economic take-offs starting in the 1960s can be related to health and education in the early 1950s, while other possible factors, such as savings, openness and democracy are not significant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

I perform Arellano-Bond GMM estimations using panel data over the period 1995-2008 and explore the growth effects of Africa's trade with China, distinguishing between the effect of imports and the effect of exports, and controlling for the role of export concentration. Four important results are obtained from the empirical analysis. First, there is no empirical evidence that exports to China enhance growth unconditionally. Second, the results suggest that export concentration enhances the growth effects of exporting to China, implying that countries which export one major commodity to China benefit more (in terms of growth) than do countries that have more diversified exports. Third, contrary to the widely held view that increasing imports from China would have a negative effect, the empirical results show that the share of China in a country's total imports has a robust positive effect on growth. Finally, the evidence suggests that there is an inverted-U relationship between exports to developed countries and growth in Africa. Overall, the results seem to provide support for the hypothesis of growth by destination (i.e., that where a country exports matters for the exporting country's growth and development). I draw on these findings to outline some policy implications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the impact of financial reforms on competitiveness and production efficiency of the banking sector, as well as the short-term and long-term impact on economic growth, in Egypt during 1992-2007. The results suggest that the reforms have a positive and significant effect on competitiveness and production efficiency. Also, the evidence shows that state-owned banks are generally less competitive than private banks and foreign banks are less competitive than domestic banks. The average x-inefficiency of Egyptian banks is around 30 per cent, which is comparable to those reported for other African countries. Finally, there is evidence to suggest a significant relationship between financial bank productive efficiency and economic growth in the short run but not in the long run. Overall, the results support the argument for continuing the financial sector reform programme in Egypt. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper considers whether trade between China and sub-Saharan Africa results in productivity-enhancing technology transfers to sub-Saharan African manufacturing firms. As trade flows between countries potentially results in interactions that lead to technological improvements in the production of goods and services, we parameterize the level of total factor productivity for African manufacturing firms as a function of foreign direct investment flow, and for the country in which it operates, trade openness with China, and its interaction with foreign direct investment. With micro-level data on manufacturing firms in five sub-Saharan African countries, we estimate the parameters of firm-level production functions between 1992 and 2004. Our parameter estimates reveal that across the firms and countries in our sample, there is no relationship between productivity-enhancing foreign direct investment and trade with China. In addition, increasing trade openness with China has no effect on the growth rate of total factor productivity. To the extent that total factor productivity and its growth is a crucial determinant of economic growth and living standards in the long run, our results suggest that increasing trade openness with China is not a long-run source of higher living standards for sub-Saharan Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the global financial and economic crisis, China has continued to experience strong export-driven growth and, indeed, became the world's largest exporting country in 2009. This rise of China in international markets presents African countries with growing competition in their home and export markets, but also with new opportunities. This paper focuses on the impacts of these developments on countries in North Africa, which are directly affected by the prominence of Chinese manufacturing. In particular, the analysis addresses two policy questions: First, is competition from China leading to substantial displacement of resources that incur significant adjustment costs while moving to new activities, or are there opportunities to exploit finer patterns of specialization that entail less disruption? And second, will policies that mitigate the impact of competition from China limit the longer-term capacity to exploit new opportunities in the global market? The findings from the empirical analysis suggest that policy makers can support North African producers in the increasingly fierce competition with China by reviewing the regulatory and incentives environment, reducing trade logistics costs, and broadening trade promotion efforts to non-traditional markets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues that cumulative causation processes are fundamental to understanding growth and development. Such processes derive from spatially concentrated increasing returns to scale including thick market effects, knowledge spillovers, sectoral and urban clustering, and self-reinforcing improvements in physical and social infrastructure. These sources of agglomeration have been extensively analyzed in the economic geography literature. They imply that spatial unevenness in economic activity and incomes is an equilibrium outcome. Growth tends to be ‘lumpy’, with some sectors in some countries growing fast while other countries lag. The policy challenge is to lift potential new centers of economic activity to the point where they can reap the productivity and investment climate advantages of increasing returns and cumulative causation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Africa's economies have diverged from other developing regions: over the past three decades growth has been much slower. In this paper I relate this to the region's distinctive physical and political geography. These features not only make Africa different from other regions, they make some parts of Africa radically different from others. Understanding these differences is critical because they imply equally substantial differences in opportunities and hence in the strategies likely to be effective for growth. No pan-African growth strategy offers a realistic prospect of success, nor can Africa simply copy the strategies of successful regions that have fundamentally different physical or political geography. I propose three strategies each of which is likely to be appropriate for a part of the region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is a widely accepted fact that persistent inequality between men and women constrains a society's productivity and ultimately slows its rate of economic growth. The economy pays for this inequality in reduced labour productivity today and diminished national output tomorrow. Motivated by this, the study aim is to assess the possibilities of enhancing productivity gains by improving the efficiency of small-scale agriculture through gender-responsive intra-household allocation of resources in south-western Nigeria. The study adopts a stochastic parametric decomposition method which yields efficiency measures that are not distorted by statistical noise to estimate the efficiency level of resource allocation by small-scale cassava producers. The results indicate that average overall productive efficiency in the sample was 75.78 per cent, implying that small-scale cassava farmers in the sample could reduce total variable cost by 24.22 per cent if they reduce labour, fertilizer, land and capital applications to levels observed in the changing input mix (technical efficiency) and then obtain optimal input mix for the given input prices and technology (allocative efficiency). The average technical efficiency and allocative efficiency indexes for the sample were 82.2 per cent and 92.2 per cent respectively. Also, evidence from empirical analysis of data from the male respondents showed that the average economic, technical and allocative efficiency indexes were 88.06 per cent, 89.34 per cent and 78.67 per cent respectively while the same computed for the female sample were 94.9 per cent, 74.85 per cent and 71.03 per cent respectively. Labour was the most limiting factor in cassava production suggesting that the technologies that enhance the productivity of labour are likely to achieve significant positive effects on cassava production. The paper shares the notion that producers' control over the means of production and impact of development are related and has influence on the economic efficiency and growth of society. Again, technical inefficiency constituted a more serious problem than allocative inefficiency, thus most cost savings will accrue to improvement in technical efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of African Development Review / Revue Africaine de Développement is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper develops a computational general equilibrium model for analyzing some chronic economic problems facing developing countries. We build a multi-period model with multiple types of capital and three different financial assets. Moreover, capital is sector specific to capture the idea that many developing countries focus on a few specific industry groups. We model both rural and urban consumers with the possibility of rural-urban migration. One further modeling feature is a partially interdependent banking sector where the performance of, say, the agricultural bank can affect the functioning of the industrial bank. The model is used to examine problems of budgetary liquidity and alternative ways of alleviating these problems. Our analysis is applied to Uganda, a country that after years of economic decline is undergoing a phase of recovery and reform. Accordingly, we develop a model that captures some of the predominant institutional features of the Ugandan economy and evaluate two realistic reform scenarios. After calibrating the model with a base case scenario we test the implications of a simultaneous tariff reduction and increase in value added taxes. We then look at the implication of debt reduction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper seeks to empirically explore the causal link between the level of financial development and economic growth in 13 sub-Saharan African countries. The empirical investigation is carried out in a vector autoregression(VAR) framework based on the theory of cointegration and error-correction representation of cointegrated variables. The results of the cointegration analysis provide evidence of the existence of a long-run relationship between financial development and economic growth in almost all(12 out of 13) of the countries. With respect to the direction of long-term causality, the results show that financial development plays a causal role on economic growth, again in eight of the countries. At the same time, evidence of bidirectional causal relationships is found in six countries. The findings imply that African countries can accelerate their economic growth by improving their financial systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of African Development Review / Revue Africaine de Développement is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of African Development Review / Revue Africaine de Développement is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of African Development Review / Revue Africaine de Développement is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of African Development Review / Revue Africaine de Développement is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)