Cities in Sub-Saharan Africa are experiencing rapid population growth. Yet their economic growth has not kept pace. Why? One factor might be low capital investment, due in part to Africa's relative poverty: Other regions have reached similar stages of urbanization at higher per capita GDP. This...

This paper investigates the sources of growth in manufacturing productivity in Cote D'Ivoire, Ethiopia and Tanzania in comparison with the case of Bangladesh. Based on the analysis of establishment census data since the mid-1990s, it finds that reallocation of market share between firms...

This paper investigates the sources of growth in manufacturing productivity in Côte d'Ivoire, Ethiopia and Tanzania in comparison with the case of Bangladesh. Based on the analysis of establishment census data since the mid-1990s, it finds that reallocation of market share between firms...

Cover -- Title -- Copyright -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Overview Africa's Cities: Opening Doors to the World -- The low development trap - Africa's urban economies are limited to nontradable goods and services -- Crowded, disconnected, and thus costly - Africa's cities are limited to...

In many developing countries, the beneficiaries of transfer programmes are determined by community-based processes, based on some general targeting rules related to needs.  This opens the door for local social and political processes to impact on who gets access.  Despite increasingly large...

Following the 2007 disputed Kenyan Presidential election unprecedented levels of violence erupted across the country adding to the history of troubled elections in Africa.  This paper offers quantitative and qualitative evidence on the incidence, impacts and issues that triggered electoral...

A large literature describes how local risk sharing networks can help individuals smooth consumption in the face of idiosyncratic economic shocks.  However, when an entire community faces a large covariate shock, and when the transaction costs of transfers are high, these risk sharing networks...

In Ghana there is a highly developed apprenticeship system where young men and women undertake sector-specific private training, which yields skills used primarily in the informal sector.  In this paper we use a 2006 urban based household survey with detailed questions on the background,...

To my knowledge this study undertakes the first comprehensive and systematic empirical test of the hypothesis that while returns to invested capital in Sub-Saharan Africa are high compared to select Asian and South American markets, investment rates are low.  I investigate three sources:...

This paper tests the external validity of a simple Dictator Game as a laboratory analogue for a naturally occurring policy-relevant decision-making context.  In Uganda, where teacher absenteeism is a problem, primary school teachers' allocations to parents in a Dictator Game are positively but...