Returns to Social Network Capital among Traders

Marcel Fafchamps and Bart Minten ()

No 145, Development Working Papers from Centro Studi Luca d'Agliano, University of Milano

Abstract: Using data on agricultural traders in Madagascar, this paper shows that social network capital has a large effect on firm productivity. Better connected traders have significantly larger sales and value added than less connected traders after controlling for physical and human inputs as well as for entrepreneur characteristics. The analysis indicates that three dimensions of social network capital should be distinguished: relationships with other traders, which among other things help firms economize on transactions costs; relationships with potential lenders; and family relationships, which reduce efficiency, possibly because of the blurring of firm boundaries. We find no evidence that social capital favors collusion.

Date: 2000-11-01
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (43)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.dagliano.unimi.it/media/WP2000_145.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Returns to social network capital among traders (2002)
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:csl:devewp:145

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Development Working Papers from Centro Studi Luca d'Agliano, University of Milano Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chiara Elli ().