The high and falling price of cement in Africa

Fabrizio Leone, Rocco Macchiavello and Tristan Reed

LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library

Abstract: Prices for several intermediate inputs, including cement, are higher in developing economies—particularly in Africa. Combining recent data from the International Comparison Program with a global directory of cement firms, we estimate an industry equilibrium model to distinguish between drivers of international price dispersion: demand, costs, conduct, and entry. Developing economies feature both higher marginal costs and higher markups. African markets are not characterized by less competitive conduct and, if anything, feature lower barriers to entry. Yet the small size of many national markets limits entry and competition and explains most of the higher markups and prices. Policy implications are discussed.

Keywords: international price dispersion; market power; market-size; cement; Africa (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D24 L13 L61 O14 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 40 pages
Date: 2025-04-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-com and nep-inv
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Published in American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, 1, April, 2025, 17(2), pp. 1 - 40. ISSN: 1945-7782

Downloads: (external link)
http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/123004/ Open access version. (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ehl:lserod:123004

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library LSE Library Portugal Street London, WC2A 2HD, U.K.. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by LSERO Manager ().