Author: Hinh T. Dinh
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN: 0821389610
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 185
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Book Description
This book examines how light manufacturing can offer a viable solution for Sub-Saharan Africa's need for structural transformation and productive job creation, given its potential competitiveness based on low wage costs and an abundance of natural resources that supply raw materials needed for industries. Based on five different analytical tools and data sources, the book examines in detail the binding constraints in each of the subsectors relevant for Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA): apparel, leather goods, metal products, agribusiness, and wood products. Ethiopia is used as an example, with Vietnam as a comparator and China as a benchmark, and with insights from Tanzania and Zambia used to draw out lessons more broadly for SSA. The book recommends a program of focused policies to exploit Africa's latent comparative advantage in a particular group of light manufacturing industries - especially leather goods, garments, and agricultural processing. These industries hold the prospect of initiating rapid, substantial, and potentially self-propelling waves of rising output, employment, productivity, and exports that can push countries like Ethiopia on a path of structural change of the sort recently achieved in both China and Vietnam. The timing for these initiatives is very appropriate as China's comparative advantage in these areas is diminishing due to steep cost increases associated with rising wages and non-wage labor costs, escalating land prices, and mounting regulatory costs. Five features of this book distinguish it from previous studies. First, the detailed work on light manufacturing at the subsector and product levels in five countries provide in-depth cost comparisons between Asia and Africa that can be used as a framework for future studies. Second, the book uses a wide array of quantitative and qualitative techniques to identify key constraints to enterprises and to evaluate firm performance differences across countries. Third, the findings that firm constraints vary by country, sector, and firm size led to a focused approach to identifying constraints and combining market-based measures and select government intervention to remove them. Fourth, the solution to light manufacturing problems cuts across many sectors: solving the manufacturing inputs problem requires solving specific issues in agriculture, education, and infrastructure. African countries cannot afford to wait until all the problems across sectors are resolved. Fifth, the book draws on experiences and solutions from other developing countries to inform its recommendations. This book will be very valuable to African policy makers, professional economists, and anyone interested in the economic development, industrialization, and structural transformation of developing countries.
Author: Hinh T. Dinh
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN: 1464800324
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 140
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Book Description
This book shows that feasible, low-cost, sharply focused policy initiatives aimed at enhancing private investment could launch Tanzania on a path to competitive light manufacturing.
Author: Hinh T. Dinh
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN: 0821389742
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 185
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Book Description
This book argues that light manufacturing can offer a viable solution for Sub-Saharan Africa, given potential competitiveness based on low wage costs and an abundance of natural resources that supply raw materials needed for industries.
Author: Hinh T. Dinh
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN: 0821399357
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 128
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Book Description
While Zambia's recent growth has been impressive, it has not been accompanied with adequate job creation. To be sustainable and to create productive employment for its people, growth needs to be accompanied by structural transformation. Such transformation entails a growing share of manufacturing output in the economy. Light Manufacturing in Zambia shows that Zambia has the potential to become regionally competitive in several light manufacturing subsectors by leveraging its comparative advantage in natural resource industries such as agriculture, livestock, and forestry. Light Manufacturing in Zambia has several innovative features. First, it provides in-depth cost comparisons between Zambia and four other countries in Asia and Africa at sector and product levels. Second, the book uses a wide array of quantitative and qualitative techniques to identify key constraints to enterprises and to evaluate differences in the performance of firms across countries. Third, it uses a focused approach to identify country- and industry- specific constraints. Fourth, it highlights the interconnectedness of constraints and solutions. For example, solving the manufacturing input problem requires actions in agriculture, education, and infrastructure. This book suggests directing government policies toward removing constraints in a few of the most promising light manufacturing sectors using practical and innovative solutions inspired by the fast-growing Asian economies whose starting point 20 years ago was not very different from Zambia's today. Growing production of light manufacturing goods would allow Zambia to capture more value from its raw materials and create more jobs.
Author: Godfrey Walakira
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :
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Book Description
Author: Hinh T. Dinh
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN: 0821399365
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 127
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Book Description
This book argues that light manufacturing is appropriate for a resource-based country like Zambia. While Zambia's recent growth has been impressive, it has not been accompanied with adequate job creation. Long-term job creation in copper production is very small; links to the rest of the economy tend to be weak as well. Besides, the development of natural resources tends to discourage job-creating sectors such as manufacturing. To be sustainable and to create productive employment for its people, growth needs to be accompanied by structural transformation. Such transformation entails a growing share of manufacturing output in the economy. In the past, Zambia's efforts to promote and facilitate industrial growth have not been very successful. Policy regimes swung from one extreme to another. In the 1980s, Zambia put complete control of the industrial sector in the hands of the state. When this model proved unsuccessful, policy shifted in the opposite direction in the 1990s, and all earlier government interventions were lifted. Neither extreme led to sustained growth of manufacturing. This book suggests an alternative: directing government policies toward removing constraints in a few of the most promising light manufacturing sectors using practical and innovative solutions inspired by the fast-growing Asian economies whose starting point 20 years ago was not very different from Zambia's today. This book has several innovative features. First, it provides in-depth cost comparisons between Zambia and four other countries in Asia and Africa at sector and product levels. Second, the book uses a wide array of quantitative and qualitative techniques to identify key constraints to enterprises and to evaluate differences in the performance of firms across countries. Third, it uses a focused approach to identify country- and industry- specific constraints. It proposes market based measures and selected government intervention to ease these constraints. Fourth, it highlights the interconnectedness of constraints and solutions. For example, solving the manufacturing input problem requires actions in agriculture, education, and infrastructure. The book shows that Zambia has the potential to become regionally competitive in several light manufacturing subsectors by leveraging its comparative advantage in natural resource industries such as agriculture, livestock, and forestry. Interventions include both the provision of public goods and the removal of existing policy distortions in the economy. Growing production of light manufacturing goods would allow Zambia to capture more value from its raw materials and create more jobs.
Author: Hinh T. Dinh
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN: 1464800340
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 155
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Book Description
Light Manufacturing in Vietnam makes the case that, if the country is to continue along a rapid economic growth path and create jobs, it must undertake a structural transformation that can lift workers from low-productivity agriculture and the mere assembly of imported inputs to higher-productivity activities. Vietnam needs to address fundamental issues in the manufacturing sector that, until now, have been masked by economic growth. The book shows that there is a dichotomy between domestic enterprises and enterprises supported by foreign direct investment. The dominant state-owned enterprises and foreign-invested firms are often not integrated with smaller, domestic firms through backward or forward links in the use of domestically produced inputs or intermediate products. Growth in the domestic light manufacturing sector has arisen from the sheer number of micro and small enterprises rather than from expansion in the number of medium and large firms. As a consequence, final products have little value added; technology and expertise are not shared; and the economy has failed to move up the structural transformation ladder. This structure of production is one of the reasons Vietnam's rapid process of industrialization over the last three decades has not been accompanied by a favorable trade balance. Policy measures to address problems in competitiveness in Vietnam must confront the dual structure of the light manufacturing sector, while raising the value added in the industry. To that end, measures must be taken to nurture the expansion of small domestic firms, while helping these firms to achieve greater productivity through trade integration. This will require improvements in labor skills and technology and in the quality and variety of products able to compete with imports. Policies to reduce the role of the state-owned sector, promote trading companies, encourage clustering and subcontracting, and raise foreign and social networking are important in this respect. To boost the value added of its goods, Vietnam needs to integrate the supply chain in assembly activities by investing in the upstream production of the goods in which it has a comparative advantage in production and in which it has already established a market share, such as agribusiness, garments, and wood. Unlike downstream activities, however, the production of the associated raw materials and intermediate goods is capital intensive and technology driven, and it requires skilled labor. Inviting foreign direct investment into these areas and reforming education and vocational systems are the best means to reach this goal. For this reason, the government should launch a complete review of the incentives for foreign direct investment to focus on upstream production and on bringing in capital and technical expertise, while improving labor and entrepreneurial skills. Based on this analysis, Light Manufacturing in Vietnam proposes concrete policy measures to increase employment and spur job creation by addressing sector-specific constraints. The book presents a set of practical recommendations for policy makers to identify, prioritize, and remove the most serious constraints in each sector. This book will be valuable for policy makers, entrepreneurs, workers, professional economists, and anyone interested in economic development, industrialization, and the structural transformation of Vietnam and of developing countries.
Author: Arkebe Oqubay
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0192566229
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 336
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Book Description
This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations. Africa's recent progress in economic growth has been uneven across countries, and has not translated into structural transformation. Although economic ties between China and Africa have made a positive contribution this engagement has been uneven, shaped by variations in strategic approach, policy ownership, and implementation capacity among African governments. As China undergoes major economic rebalancing to upgrade to an innovation-driven economy, this is bound to affect China-Africa relations, offering both opportunities and challenges. Authored by leading scholars on Africa, China, and China-Africa relations, this volume brings together stimulating and thought-provoking perspectives, and insightful analyses. Focusing on Africa's economic development, it looks at core areas of structural transformation: productive investment and industrialization, international trade, infrastructure development, and financing. China-Africa relations are considered in the context of the global division of labour and power, and through the history and contexts of both China and Africa, a very diverse continent. This volume seeks to fill the gap in the existing literature, steer policy and scholarly debate on the progress and trajectory of China-Africa cooperation, and analyze China's development path as a source of learning for Africa.
Author: Hinh T. Dinh
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN: 0821396331
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 238
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Book Description
This book presents empirical analyses of manufacturing firm performance in Africa based on the World Bank Enterprise Survey and on a one-time quantitative survey conducted for the World Bank by the Center for the Study of African Economies of Oxford University.
Author: Diao, Xinshen
Publisher: Intl Food Policy Res Inst
ISBN:
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 85
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Book Description
Recent growth accelerations in Africa are characterized by increasing productivity in agriculture, a declining share of the labor force employed in agriculture and declining productivity in modern sectors such as manufacturing. To shed light on this puzzle, we disaggregate firms in the manufacturing sector by size using two newly created panels of manufacturing firms, one for Tanzania covering 2008-2016 and one for Ethiopia covering 1996-2017. Our analysis reveals a dichotomy between larger firms that exhibit superior productivity performance but do not expand employment much, and small firms that absorb employment but do not experience any productivity growth. We suggest the poor employment performance of large firms is related to use of capital-intensive techniques associated with global trends in technology.
