Recent writing on industrial policy stresses the need for coordination between the public and private sectors. This paper examines the performance of one such coordination mechanism, Presidential Investors' Advisory Councils, in Ethiopia, Senegal, Tanzania, and Uganda. It finds that the councils have been better at focusing attention on a donor-driven agenda of regulatory reforms than they have been at addressing the binding constraints to private investment. Notwithstanding their name, the actual level of commitment to Presidential Investors' Advisory Councils varies quite substantially. None have established a track record of experimentation, effective implementation, and evaluation of the impact of decisions taken.
After stagnating for much of its postcolonial history, economic performance in Sub?Saharan Africa has markedly improved. Since 1995, average economic growth has been close to 5 percent per year. Has Africa finally turned the corner? This paper analyzes growth accelerations and decelerations-that is, country level deviations from long?run trend growth. Seen from this perspective, Africa's record of slow and volatile growth reflects a pattern of offsetting accelerations and declines, and much of the improvement in economic performance in Africa post 1995 turns out to be due to a substantial reduction in the frequency and severity of growth decelerations. The fall in economic declines since 1995 is largely due to better macroeconomic policies, but changes in such 'growth determinants' as investment, export diversification, and productivity have not accompanied the growth boom. Lack of change in these variables and the significant role played by natural resources in sparking growth accelerations suggest that Africa's growth recovery was fragile, even before the recent global economic crisis. The paper concludes by setting out four elements of a strategy that can help move Africa from fewer mistakes to sustained growth: managing natural resources better, pushing nontraditional exports, building the African private sector, and creating new skills.
After stagnating for much of its postcolonial history, economic performance in Sub?Saharan Africa has markedly improved. Since 1995, average economic growth has been close to 5 percent per year. Has Africa finally turned the corner? This paper analyzes growth accelerations and decelerations-that is, country level deviations from long?run trend growth. Seen from this perspective, Africa's record of slow and volatile growth reflects a pattern of offsetting accelerations and declines, and much of the improvement in economic performance in Africa post 1995 turns out to be due to a substantial reduction in the frequency and severity of growth decelerations. The fall in economic declines since 1995 is largely due to better macroeconomic policies, but changes in such 'growth determinants' as investment, export diversification, and productivity have not accompanied the growth boom. Lack of change in these variables and the significant role played by natural resources in sparking growth accelerations suggest that Africa's growth recovery was fragile, even before the recent global economic crisis. The paper concludes by setting out four elements of a strategy that can help move Africa from fewer mistakes to sustained growth: managing natural resources better, pushing nontraditional exports, building the African private sector, and creating new skills.
Commenting on Francois Fouinat's paper (2004), this article suggests that failure to understand & incorporate security concerns into developmental policy may significantly limit the ability of developing countries to achieve acceptable rates of growth & poverty reduction. To illustrate this risk, examples are drawn from three different domains within which security interacts with economic progress: first, at the national level, through civil war, prolonged ethnic or factional violence, & fragmentation of the state; second, at the international level, through the impact of national security policies of OECD countries on international economic relations; & third, at the household or individual level, through the effects of crime, discrimination, or abuse by public officials in relation to economic opportunity & personal dignity. 2 Tables, 9 References. T. K. Brown
In: World development: the multi-disciplinary international journal devoted to the study and promotion of world development, Band 22, Heft 4, S. 615-625
In: Page , J & Tarp , F 2020 , Implications for Public Policy . in J Page & F Tarp (eds) , Mining for Change : Natural Resources and Industry in Africa . Oxford University Press , Oxford , WIDER Studies in Development Economics , pp. 449-471 . https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198851172.003.0020
Natural resources can make diversification and structural change more challenging. This chapter focuses on why public policy matters. International competitiveness depends on both relative prices and on the policy and institutional changes and investments that governments make to enhance it. Drawing on the five country case studies in this volume, the authors suggest lessons for the design of policies to promote structural change in Africa's resource exporters. They address the three key themes—managing the boom, the construction sector, and linking industry to the resource—then propose ideas for widening options for structural change. These include reforms to deal with 'Dutch disease', expanding the concept of structural change from a focus on industrialization to 'industries without smokestacks', and investing in knowledge.