Challenging the Orthodoxy: African Development in the Age of Openness

2007 ◽  
Vol 6 (4) ◽  
pp. 457-493 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jamee Moudud ◽  
Karl Botchway
Keyword(s):  
Trade Openness ◽  
Developmental State ◽  
Policy Position ◽  
Income Convergence ◽  
African Countries ◽  
African Development ◽  
The North ◽  
Empirical Level ◽  
History Of ◽  
Sub Saharan

AbstractDoes trade openness necessarily lead to income convergence between countries in the North and South and hence facilitates social development? This paper challenges this claim with regards to African development in the age of neo-liberalism. The paper argues that a one-sided reading of the history of an early phase of globalization by advocates of neo-liberalism seems to have turned trade openness into a mantra for African development. Furthermore the paper challenges the rhetoric of competitiveness that underpins the rationale for neo-liberalism by critiquing the neoclassical model of competition. The neo-liberal policy position, as the paper suggests is problematic at an empirical level also. In a test for convergence for eleven sub-Saharan African countries described as good adjusters by advocates of trade openness, the paper shows that a straightforward openness per se guarantees nothing as far their growth rates are concerned. Rather this paper suggests that the role of the “developmental state” needs to be brought back in order to facilitate the international competitiveness of African countries. It will be argued that such a role for the developmental state rests on a very different conceptualization of the nature of capitalist competition and growth. In the final instance, then, we suggest the need for building a theory of the developmental state that rests on non-neoclassical macro- and micro-foundations.

scholarly journals Long-Run and Short-Run Effects of Trade Openness on Life Quality in Sub-Saharan Africa

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (8) ◽  
pp. 72-83
Author(s):  
Guivis Zeufack Nkemgha ◽  
Aimée Viviane Mbita ◽  
Symphorin Engone Mve ◽  
Rodrigue Tchoffo
Keyword(s):  
Trade Openness ◽  
Life Quality ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
African Countries ◽  
Pooled Mean Group ◽  
Long Run ◽  
Short Run ◽  
French Colonies ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
British Colonies

This paper contributes to the understanding of the other neglected effects of trade openness by analysing how it affects life quality in sub-Saharan African countries over the period 2000–2016. We used two trade openness indicators, namely: Squalli and Wilson index and the rate of trade. The empirical evidence is based on a pooled mean group approach. With two panels differentiated by their colonial origin, the following findings are established: the trade openness variable measured by Squalli and Wilson index has no effect on life quality in the both groups of countries in the short-run. However, it has a positive and significant effect on life quality in the both group of countries in the long-run. The use of the rate of trade confirms the results in the both groups of countries in the long-run. The contribution of trade openness to life quality is 3.27 and 5.19 times higher in the Former British Colonies than that recorded in the Former French Colonies of SSA respectively to the use of Squalli and Wilson index and the rate of trade. Overall, we find strong evidence supporting the view that trade openness promotes life quality in SSA countries in the long run.

The Global Green Bean and Other Tales of Madness

2004 ◽  
Author(s):  
Susanne Freidberg
Keyword(s):  
Social Institutions ◽  
Food Provisioning ◽  
Food Retailing ◽  
Green Beans ◽  
African Countries ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
History Of ◽  
Food Scare ◽  
Late Twentieth ◽  
Sub Saharan

The last years of the 20th century were tough times for selling food to Europeans. The competition was fierce, the rules uncertain, and the retail markets picky. It was not just that huge supermarket chains had come to dominate food retailing, and to demand products conforming to ever-higher standards of convenience and aesthetic quality; these trends were common across the industrialized world. In addition, they demanded that the suppliers of those products— farmers and manufacturers, but also a range of intermediaries—meet standards of hygiene and accountability that were unimaginable twenty, even ten years earlier. The supermarkets wanted assurances that none of their products would set off another food scare; too many had already shaken European consumers’ faith in the supermarkets’ increasingly globalized offerings. On the supermarket shelves, these assurances might appear as new labels or packaging, if they appeared at all. What consumers largely did not see was the work that went into providing them with food as certifiably pure as it was pretty. This work took place on farms and in packhouses; in consultants’ offices and corporate boardrooms; in activists’ meetings and chemical analysts’ laboratories. It demanded long flights, short deadlines, and nonstop vigilance. Above all, the work of assuring the overall goodness of globalized food required all kinds of people and things to deal with each other in new ways, and often across great distances. In this sense, it transformed the social relationships of food provisioning on both an interpersonal and transcontinental scale. This book explores how these changes took shape within two fresh vegetable trades, or commodity networks, linking two Sub-Saharan African countries to their former European colonial powers. The francophone network brings Burkina Faso’s green beans to France, while the anglophone network brings an assortment of prepackaged fresh vegetables from Zambia to the United Kingdom. Broadly similar in some ways, they differ radically in others, including the ways that they experienced Europe’s late twentieth-century food scares. By exploring the history of these differences and how they are sustained and transformed in specific places, practices, and social institutions, I hope to illuminate the relationship between culture and power in globalized food provisioning.

scholarly journals Trade Openness and Competitiveness: BRICS and Sub-Saharan Africa Countries

2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 64-84
Author(s):  
Lamia Jamel ◽  
◽  
Abdelkader Derbali ◽  
Ali Lamouchi ◽  
Ahmed Elnagar ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Trade Openness ◽  
Industrial Sector ◽  
Trade Flows ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
African Countries ◽  
Brics Countries ◽  
Manufactured Products ◽  
Identification Test ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
Do So

The aim of this study is to highlight the key competitiveness elements that promote trade flows between the BRICS countries of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa and those in Sub-Saharan Africa. To do so, we employ the econometrics of panel data during the period of study from 1995 to 2018. We apply the Blundell and Bond GMM estimator [1998] and we utilize Sargan’s [1958] over-identification test to confirm the validity of delayed variables in level and difference as instruments used in our estimations. The empirical findings of our study show that trade policy actions, high natural resource allocation and the evolution of gross domestic product (GDP) per capita of the participating countries promote this trade openness between BRICS and Sub-Saharan Africa economies. Additionally, African countries need to develop their industrial sector to export more high-value manufactured products.

scholarly journals Non-communicable respiratory disease in Malawi: a systematic review and meta-analysis

2020 ◽  
Vol 32 (2) ◽  
pp. 64-73
Author(s):  
Rebecca Nightingale
Keyword(s):  
Systematic Review ◽  
Respiratory Disease ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
Airflow Obstruction ◽  
Secondary Data ◽  
Chronic Respiratory Disease ◽  
African Countries ◽  
History Of ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
The Life Course

BackgroundNon-communicable respiratory diseases are important contributors to morbidity and mortality in sub-Saharan African countries such as Malawi. AimTo conduct a systematic review of the available literature relating to chronic respiratory disease in Malawi. MethodsWe conducted a systematic protocol-driven literature search of key scientific databases including Scopus and Medline. Papers were independently assessed for eligibility by two authors and included if they reported objective measures (including self-reported standard symptoms) of chronic respiratory disease and were conducted in Malawi. A meta-analysis of available estimates was then conducted. We re-analysed data from three of these studies in a secondary data analysis to allow for between-study comparisons. ResultsOur search identified 393 papers of which 17 (5 involving children and 12 involving adults) met the inclusion criteria. Wheeze was the symptom most frequently reported in children in the community (12.1%), hospital (11.2%) and HIV clinic (8.1%) settings. Cough was the symptom most frequently reported by adults in the community (3–18%). Spirometric abnormalities varied substantially between studies. For example, in adults, airflow obstruction varied between 2.3% and 20% and low forced vital capacity (FVC) varied between 2.7% and 52.8%. ConclusionWe identified a high burden of chronic respiratory symptoms and abnormal spirometry (particularly low FVC) within paediatric and adult populations in Malawi. The estimates for country-wide burden related to this disease were limited by the heterogeneity of the methods used to assess symptoms and spirometry. There is an urgent need to develop a better understanding of the determinants and natural history of non-communicable respiratory disease across the life-course in Malawi.

scholarly journals Determinants of Foreign Direct Investment: A Panel Data Analysis for Sub-Saharan African Countries

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 80-87 ◽  
Author(s):  
Semra Boğa
Keyword(s):  
Data Analysis ◽  
Panel Data ◽  
Panel Data Analysis ◽  
Trade Openness ◽  
Gdp Growth ◽  
Annual Data ◽  
African Countries ◽  
Fdi Inflows ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
Determinants Of Fdi

The aim of this study is to investigate the determinants of FDI inflows in Sub-Saharan African countries. In this study, panel data analysis was performed by using annual data from 23 countries for the period of 1975-2017. The Pesaran (2004) Cross-Section Dependence Test was performed to test correlation and IPS Unit Root Test was applied to reveal the stationary level between the units. Based on the PMG estimator results GDP growth, trade openness, domestic credit, natural resources and telecommunication infrastructure are all found to be the determinants of FDI inflows in Sub-Saharan countries in the long term. But, in the short term, only the GDP growth and trade openness determines the FDI inflows.

scholarly journals Washington Consensus Reforms and Lessons for Economic Performance in Sub-Saharan Africa

2021 ◽  
Vol 35 (3) ◽  
pp. 133-156
Author(s):  
Belinda Archibong ◽  
Brahima Coulibaly ◽  
Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala
Keyword(s):  
Economic Performance ◽  
Trade Openness ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Washington Consensus ◽  
Fiscal Discipline ◽  
African Countries ◽  
Policy Performance ◽  
Real Gdp ◽  
Per Capita ◽  
Sub Saharan

Over three decades after market-oriented structural reforms termed “Washington Consensus” policies were first implemented, we revisit the evidence on policy adoption and the effects of these policies on socio-economic performance in sub-Saharan African countries. We focus on three key ubiquitous reform policies around privatization, fiscal discipline, and trade openness and document significant improvements in economic performance for reformers over the past two decades. Following initial declines in per capita economic growth over the 1980s and 1990s, reform adopters experienced notable increases in per capita real GDP growth in the post-2000 period. We complement aggregate analysis with four country case studies that highlight important lessons for effective reform. Notably, the ability to implement pro-poor policies alongside market-oriented reforms played a central role in successful policy performance.

scholarly journals History of ‘swine fever’ in Southern Africa

2013 ◽  
Vol 84 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mary-Louise Penrith
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Southern Africa ◽  
African Swine Fever ◽  
Classical Swine Fever ◽  
Western Cape ◽  
Eastern Cape ◽  
African Region ◽  
African Countries ◽  
The North ◽  
History Of

The histories of the two swine fevers in southern Africa differ widely. Classical swine fever (hog cholera) has been known in the northern hemisphere since 1830 and it is probable that early cases of ‘swine fever’ in European settlers’ pigs in southern Africa were accepted to be that disease. It was only in 1921 that the first description of African swine fever as an entity different from classical swine fever was published after the disease had been studied in settlers’ pigs in Kenya. Shortly after that, reports of African swine fever in settlers’ pigs emerged from South Africa and Angola. In South Africa, the report related to pigs in the north-eastern part of the country. Previously (in 1905 or earlier) a disease assumed to be classical swine fever caused high mortality among pigs in the Western Cape and was only eradicated in 1918. African swine fever was found over the following years to be endemic in most southern African countries. Classical swine fever, however, apart from an introduction with subsequent endemic establishment in Madagascar and a number of introductions into Mauritius, the last one in 2000, had apparently remained absent from the region until it was diagnosed in the Western and subsequently the Eastern Cape of South Africa in 2005. It was eradicated by 2007. The history of these diseases in the southern African region demonstrates their importance and their potential for spread over long distances, emphasising the need for improved management of both diseases wherever they occur.

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