Impact of the business environment on output and productivity in Africa

Africa is the poorest part of the world and it has the worst environment for long term business success by most standards. Empirical works normally find a negative correlation between income per worker and measures for poor business environment. This paper develops a general equilibrium model to assess the quantitative effects of the business environment, including access to finance, regulation, crime, corruption and infrastructure, on output and TFP for 30 Sub-Saharan African countries. We find that the quantitative effects of these areas of the business environment are large. They together can explain about 67% of the variation in income per capita relative to the US. Improving these dimensions of the business environment will be key for the long term development of the continent.Business environment, Investment Climate, African Development, Productivity

Impact of the business environment on output and productivity in Africa

We develop a general equilibrium model to assess the quantitative effects of the business environment, including regulation, crime, corruption, infrastructure and access to finance, on output and total factor productivity (TFP) for 30 Sub-Saharan African countries. The first four dimensions create inefficiencies at the firm level and are modeled as a tax on output. From the data, we find that on average firms in Africa lose a fifth of their sales due to those inefficiencies. On the other hand, poor access to credit affects the reallocation of resources across firms, capital formation and production scale. We find that the quantitative effects of these dimensions of the business environment are large, leading to decreases in output and TFP in the range of 40 to 77 percent and 18 to 44 percent respectively. Overall, they explain 67 percent of the variation in income per worker relative to the US.Business environment, Investment Climate, African Development, Productivity, Credit Constraints

Constraints to the Growth of Small Firms in Northern Myanmar

This paper uses survey data collected from Kalaymyo, a small urban city in North West Myanmar, to characterize firms and analyze the constraints limiting their growth. The level of firm ownership is very high but most firms are small, informal, operated out of the home, earning low income and with no employees. The most binding constraints are related to financing constraints, especially lack of access to informal credit. This is followed by the high degree of competition as the majority of firms are small retailers selling non-differentiated goods. This lack of credit combined with an apparent aversion to debt, limits the ability of entrepreneurs to take advantage of the high returns available on investment. We find that firms that made a capital investment over the last three years are significantly more profitable than those that did not

A Three-Sector Model of Structural Transformation and Economic Development

Growth accounting exercises point to aggregate TFP dierences as the dominant source of the large cross-country income dierences. In this paper, I ask which sectors account for the aggregate TFP gap between rich and poor countries. Data limitations for developing countries have led researchers to use indirect methods for estimating sectoral TFPs. This paper proposes a new approach for estimating sectoral TFP using panel data on sectoral employment shares and GDP per capita. The approach builds a model of structural transformation and uses it to infer sectoral TFP time series consistent with the reallocation of labor between sectors and GDP per capita growth of a set of developing countries over a 40-year period. I nd that relative to the US, developing countries are the least productive in agriculture, followed by services and then manufacturing. While these ndings are consistent with empirical studies, they dier from ndings in the growth literature

Structural Transformation in Developed and Developing Countries

Dierences in key features of the development process across rich and poor countries can provide clues to the sources of the large variation of cross- country income. Kuznets included structural transformation as one of six stylized facts of economic development, nding that developed countries all followed the same process. In this paper, I compare structural transformation processes in developed and developing countries. I nd that developing countries follow distinct structural transformation paths that deviate from that followed by developed countries. A puzzling nding is the presence of substantial sectoral changes during times of economic stagnation or decline

Effectiveness of foreign aid in Small Island Developing States

Global flows of Official Development Assistance are large and there is a large literature devoted to testing the effectiveness of these large flows. While among the poorest and the top recipients of foreign aid, Small Island Developing States (SIDS) are usually left out in the aid effectiveness literature. This paper seeks to remedy this by testing the main conditionality models of the literature using a sample of 37 SIDS. We also specify a new model that best fit the data for these countries. The general result is that aid has a positive and significant effect on growth in a number of specifications. However, we do not find supporting evidence that aid is effective only in countries with good policies or there is a threshold above which it has diminishing returns. Instead, we find, in our preferred specification, that aid is effective in the presence of sufficiently good governmental and social institutions

Impact of the business environment on output and productivity in Africa

Africa is the poorest part of the world and it has the worst environment for long term business success by most standards. Empirical works normally find a negative correlation between income per worker and measures for poor business environment. This paper develops a general equilibrium model to assess the quantitative effects of the business environment, including access to finance, regulation, crime, corruption and infrastructure, on output and TFP for 30 Sub-Saharan African countries. We find that the quantitative effects of these areas of the business environment are large. They together can explain about 67% of the variation in income per capita relative to the US. Improving these dimensions of the business environment will be key for the long term development of the continent

Effectiveness of foreign aid in Small Island Developing States

Global flows of Official Development Assistance are large and there is a large literature devoted to testing the effectiveness of these large flows. While among the poorest and the top recipients of foreign aid, Small Island Developing States (SIDS) are usually left out in the aid effectiveness literature. This paper seeks to remedy this by testing the main conditionality models of the literature using a sample of 37 SIDS. We also specify a new model that best fit the data for these countries. The general result is that aid has a positive and significant effect on growth in a number of specifications. However, we do not find supporting evidence that aid is effective only in countries with good policies or there is a threshold above which it has diminishing returns. Instead, we find, in our preferred specification, that aid is effective in the presence of sufficiently good governmental and social institutions

Mortality from gastrointestinal congenital anomalies at 264 hospitals in 74 low-income, middle-income, and high-income countries: a multicentre, international, prospective cohort study

Summary Background Congenital anomalies are the fifth leading cause of mortality in children younger than 5 years globally. Many gastrointestinal congenital anomalies are fatal without timely access to neonatal surgical care, but few studies have been done on these conditions in low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs). We compared outcomes of the seven most common gastrointestinal congenital anomalies in low-income, middle-income, and high-income countries globally, and identified factors associated with mortality. Methods We did a multicentre, international prospective cohort study of patients younger than 16 years, presenting to hospital for the first time with oesophageal atresia, congenital diaphragmatic hernia, intestinal atresia, gastroschisis, exomphalos, anorectal malformation, and Hirschsprung’s disease. Recruitment was of consecutive patients for a minimum of 1 month between October, 2018, and April, 2019. We collected data on patient demographics, clinical status, interventions, and outcomes using the REDCap platform. Patients were followed up for 30 days after primary intervention, or 30 days after admission if they did not receive an intervention. The primary outcome was all-cause, in-hospital mortality for all conditions combined and each condition individually, stratified by country income status. We did a complete case analysis. Findings We included 3849 patients with 3975 study conditions (560 with oesophageal atresia, 448 with congenital diaphragmatic hernia, 681 with intestinal atresia, 453 with gastroschisis, 325 with exomphalos, 991 with anorectal malformation, and 517 with Hirschsprung’s disease) from 264 hospitals (89 in high-income countries, 166 in middleincome countries, and nine in low-income countries) in 74 countries. Of the 3849 patients, 2231 (58·0%) were male. Median gestational age at birth was 38 weeks (IQR 36–39) and median bodyweight at presentation was 2·8 kg (2·3–3·3). Mortality among all patients was 37 (39·8%) of 93 in low-income countries, 583 (20·4%) of 2860 in middle-income countries, and 50 (5·6%) of 896 in high-income countries (p<0·0001 between all country income groups). Gastroschisis had the greatest difference in mortality between country income strata (nine [90·0%] of ten in lowincome countries, 97 [31·9%] of 304 in middle-income countries, and two [1·4%] of 139 in high-income countries; p≤0·0001 between all country income groups). Factors significantly associated with higher mortality for all patients combined included country income status (low-income vs high-income countries, risk ratio 2·78 [95% CI 1·88–4·11], p<0·0001; middle-income vs high-income countries, 2·11 [1·59–2·79], p<0·0001), sepsis at presentation (1·20 [1·04–1·40], p=0·016), higher American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) score at primary intervention (ASA 4–5 vs ASA 1–2, 1·82 [1·40–2·35], p<0·0001; ASA 3 vs ASA 1–2, 1·58, [1·30–1·92], p<0·0001]), surgical safety checklist not used (1·39 [1·02–1·90], p=0·035), and ventilation or parenteral nutrition unavailable when needed (ventilation 1·96, [1·41–2·71], p=0·0001; parenteral nutrition 1·35, [1·05–1·74], p=0·018). Administration of parenteral nutrition (0·61, [0·47–0·79], p=0·0002) and use of a peripherally inserted central catheter (0·65 [0·50–0·86], p=0·0024) or percutaneous central line (0·69 [0·48–1·00], p=0·049) were associated with lower mortality. Interpretation Unacceptable differences in mortality exist for gastrointestinal congenital anomalies between lowincome, middle-income, and high-income countries. Improving access to quality neonatal surgical care in LMICs will be vital to achieve Sustainable Development Goal 3.2 of ending preventable deaths in neonates and children younger than 5 years by 2030