The COVID-19 pandemic has wreaked havoc on the global economy, with world output contracting at 3.5% in 2020, and no recovery likely before the fourth...
East Asia’s successful experience in accelerating the process of industrial development with SEZs paved way for the use of SEZs as policy instruments in Africa. In southern Africa, Zambia and South Africa instituted SEZs in legal and institutional...
On 17 February 2021 the Groningen Growth and Development Centre (GGDC) and UNU-WIDER Economic Transformation Database (ETD) will be launched. The new...
This paper examines industrialization trends in developing countries. It uses the GGDC/UNU-WIDER Economic Transformation Database, which provides time series of employment and real and nominal value added annually by 12 sectors in 51 countries for...
Special Economic Zones (SEZs) have become common across Southern Africa in the past 20 years. In line with experiences in the rest of the world, they have had at best marginal success. Their essential premise is that it should be more efficient and...
This paper provides an overview of the structure, key functions, and characteristics of the motorcycle parts and aftermarket industries in Southern Africa in order to identify challenges to and opportunities for growth in these industries. The...
The main characteristics of 'the Swedish model' are arguably related to the country's knowledge-intensive industry and its advanced welfare state. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the historical development of these two features of the Swedish...
At the end of last year, I filmed a lecture that will be part of a massive open online course (MOOC) on industrialization in Africa. The course is...
Unlike in the past where industrial policy was either focused on creation and growth of state-owned firms or alternatively consisted merely of broadly functional policies without consideration for firm or entrepreneurial specifics, the requirement...
China has undergone remarkable economic growth spearheaded by industrialization. Chinese industry demands a wide variety of raw materials in increasing amounts in order to manufacture all kinds of products. Industrial demand exceeds domestic supply...
This paper explores the implications of climate change for industrial policy (IP). Five implications are discussed, namely the need for international coordination of IPs; for putting human development, and not emission targets, as the overriding...
This study shows that China’s post-1949 state-led industrialization has closely followed an underlying path that began in the late nineteenth century. It was initiated by pressing national defence needs and has since been motivated by the same and...
In considering pathways to industrialization in the twenty-first century, cognisance needs to be taken of the fact that many countries have actually been deindustrializing. This paper analyses deindustrialization experiences internationally, by...
Industrial policy has attracted considerable controversy in the development context. This paper makes a case for a pragmatic and limited approach to interventions as a means of stimulating industrialization in the context of current and future...
This paper examines Indonesia’s industrialization performance and policies, including its latecomer status, its generally rapid growth since the mid-1960s, its pronounced policy and performance episodes, and its ambivalent embrace of globalization...
How does international trade affect structural transformation in developing countries? We use data on sectoral allocation of labour and value-added in 46 developing economies over the period 1995–2017 and exploit for identification plausibly...
Fast-growing developing countries have emerged as an important destination and source of trade, investments and technology. Furthermore, trade between developing countries has grown rapidly over the last decades, and is becoming more diversified...
Martin Medina As world leaders gather in Copenhagen this month for the fifteenth United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP15) the challenges...
This paper argues that new technologies—for communication, such as mobile phones and the internet, but also for manufacturing, agriculture, energy, and transport—have the potential to bridge many of the productivity gaps between sub-Saharan Africa...
This paper draws on both successful and failing cases of industrialization in China to analyse the role of local governments in fostering the growth of light manufacturing. The broad spectrum of support types and the intimate knowledge of enterprise...
This paper chronicles the evolution of industry in Ghana over the post-independence era from an inward over-protected import substitution industrialization strategy of 1960-83 to an outward liberalized strategy during 1984-2000, and since 2001, to...
Charles S. Maier When the Berlin Wall fell, twenty years ago, on 9 November 1989, many expected that the East German (German Democratic Republic - DDR...
Part of Book Achieving Development Success
Adam Szirmai Since the late 18th century, the manufacturing sector has been the main engine of growth and catch up. Presently, however, service sector...
Africa’s improved growth performance over the last 15 years provides an opportunity for the continent to transit from recovery to structural transformation. This paper reviews the evolution of development theory and practice, the role of agriculture...
Can the increasing significance of knowledge-products in national income— the growing weightless economy—influence economic development? Those technologies reduce “distance” between consumers and knowledge production. This paper analyzes a model...
This issue contains seven articles addressing the major changes underway in the integration of economies in southern Africa. This special issue is based on the UNU-WIDER project 'Regional growth and development in Southern Africa'. This project aims...
This week I attended the 28th Africa Industrialization Day at the United Nations Headquarters in New York. Even sympathetic readers may reasonably ask...
The question ‘why is there so little industrialization in Africa?’ has been a key focus of UNU-WIDER researchers and research partners for the last...
This paper traces the role of local content in Zambia’s mining sector in supporting industrialization and economic diversification. It assesses productive linkages and manufacturing competitiveness during import-substitution industrialization and...
Industrial transformation of Asia arguably constitutes the most surprising and dramatic change in the global economy in the last fifty years. This paper provides an outline of some of the most important trends of this development and analyses...
During the past week, I participated in two international conferences. The first was the WIDER Development Conference in Helsinki: Think development -...
Inspired by Gunnar Myrdal’s core concepts discussed in his seminal work, Asian Drama: An Inquiry into the Poverty of Nations, published in 1968, this paper analyses the opening-up experiences of three Asian countries (China, India, and Malaysia) by...
The impressive economic growth record of Thailand before 1997 was dominated by the increasing importance of modem industrialization, as well as the expansion of other sectors. This occurred at the expense of agriculture, which accounts for the...
This paper establishes a theoretical framework for the ongoing research project of UNU/WIDBR on Property Rights Regimes, Microeconomic Incentives and Development. It identifies the major research interests, questions, and focuses. The theoretical...
Over the last thirty-five years, Costa Rican exports (in dollars) have grown at an average annual growth rate of 10.8 per cent. In the context of an import substituting industrialization and subregional integration, exports grew at increasingly...
From the book: Oxford Handbook of Africa and Economics, Vol. 2.Africa has achieved a much-improved agricultural and economic growth performance over the last 15 years. During 2003-2010 the agricultural sector grew at an annual average rate of almost...
From the book: Oxford Handbook of Africa and Economics, Vol. 2.
9 May 2013 Lorraine Telfer-Taivainen and Roger Williamson Pathways to Industrialization in the Twenty-First Century, (edited by Adam Szirmai, Wim...
Tony Addison A visit to Buenos Aires in September provided a good vantage point to look at the euro zone’s deepening crisis. Angle readers will recall...
A sustainable pathway for Africa in the twenty-first century is laid out in the setting of the development of innovation capabilities and the capture of latecomer advantages. Africa has missed out on these possibilities in the twentieth century while...
Structural transformation is a pre-requisite for sustained growth and poverty reduction — such was the conviction of development economists in the mid twentieth century. They demonstrated empirically that moving resources out of low-productivity...
Discussions on the developing world’s industrial policies have largely neglected the role of state-owned entities. This paper argues that the resurgence of state capitalism has been, in part, the response of developing countries to the recent pattern...
This working paper is the fourth in a series that forms part of the project ‘Southern Africa – Towards Inclusive Economic Development’, a three-year partnership between UNU-WIDER and the South African government aimed at generating a better...
Conventional explanations of Taiwan and China’s economic success point to the shift from an import-substituting industrialization (ISI) strategy to an export-oriented industrialization (EOI) strategy. This paper argues that the development strategies...
Southern African countries—mainly Zambia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo—account for around a seventh of global production of copper. In the 2010s, they imported over a third of the associated capital goods and components from South Africa...
Africa should industrialize. Without structural change it cannot sustain recent growth. Economies with more diverse and sophisticated industrial sectors tend to grow faster. But since 1980 Africa has deindustrialized. The paper shows that between...
When Gunnar Myrdal published his magnum opus, Asian Drama: An Inquiry into the Poverty of Nations, in 1968, he was deeply pessimistic about the development prospects in Asia. The fifty years since witnessed a remarkable economic transformation in...
Supermarkets are strong catalysts to stimulate the growth and development of producers and suppliers of processed food and manufactured products in Southern Africa. This paper assesses the role of supermarkets and governments in developing supplier...
Tony Addison As the snow continues to lie deep across Helsinki, UNU-WIDER is putting the last touches to the ReCom results meeting on ‘aid and the...
Tony Addison We start the new year at a fast pace, preparing for the ReCom results meeting on ‘Aid and the Social Sectors’ in Stockholm on 13th March...
30 April 2013 Tony Addison As April closes, our thoughts turn to UNU-WIDER’s spring/summer programme. And it’s a busy one. June sees us back in...
It's imperative to demolish myths around the economic achievements of China and India and get a better sense of the real challenges. The author of the...
Turkey is not the shining example of successful adjustment that it is often made out to be. The stabilization and adjustment policies followed since 1980 have actually undermined the structure of its economic development without correcting its...
Japan was the first non-western country to accomplish successful industrialization, and the dominant perception of its ‘industrial policy’ had over-emphasized specific characteristics of Japan. However, from the perspective of today’s development...
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