What is driving the 'African Growth Miracle'?

Margaret McMillan and Kenneth Harttgen

No 20077, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: We show that much of Africa's recent growth and poverty reduction can be traced to a substantive decline in the share of the labor force engaged in agriculture. This decline has been accompanied by a systematic increase in the productivity of the labor force, as it has moved from low productivity agriculture to higher productivity manufacturing and services. These declines have been more rapid in countries where the initial share of the labor force engaged in agriculture is the highest and where commodity price increases have been accompanied by improvements in the quality of governance.

JEL-codes: O13 O4 Q16 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-afr, nep-dev and nep-gro
Note: ITI
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (39)

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Working Paper: What is driving the 'African Growth Miracle'? (2015)
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