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Working Paper
Contract clientelism: How infrastructure contracts fund vote-buyingWhere does the money come from to buy votes? We argue that an important source of funds for vote-buying comes from ‘contract clientelism’, or the provision of public contracts to private firms in exchange for campaign donations...
Contracts vote-buying ClientelismWorking Paper
COVID-19 and trade facilitation in Southern Africa: Implications for the AfCFTACOVID-19 has created a trade crisis in Southern Africa, with a dramatic slowdown in cross-border trade...
COVID-19 Trade facilitation Regional integrationBlog
Infrastructure spend: insights from the effect of a bridge across the Zambezi on maize prices
Investments in infrastructure – such as roads – typically aim to reduce transport costs, stimulate trade, and make new production activities viable. Across sub-Saharan Africa, the need for such investments is widely acknowledged ...
Infrastructure Agriculture MozambiqueJournal Article
Infrastructure improvements and maize market integration: Bridging the Zambezi in MozambiqueHistorically, transport infrastructure connecting the most agriculturally productive areas of Mozambique and the richer southern region has been poor...
Infrastructure Agricultural market performance PricesResearch Brief
Solutions for designing better special economic zones programmes in AfricaSpecial economic zones (SEZ) in Africa are generally regarded as underperforming relative to their peers in the rest of the world...
Design attributes Implementation InfrastructureWorking Paper
The potential of extractive industries as anchor investments for broader regional developmentThe paper reviews what we know about the possibilities of designing and implementing policy measures that raise the contribution of the extractive industries’ production/consumption links to economic growth and wellbeing, and reviews how polici...
Downstream processing Extractive industries InfrastructureWorking Paper
Investigating the fiscal resource curse: What’s China got to do with it?The term fiscal resource curse refers to countries’ inability to raise taxes from a broad base in the presence of natural resources...
China Infrastructure Natural resourcesWorking Paper
Resource sector concessions and spatial development in Southern AfricaThis paper explores how Southern Africa can leverage its mineral resources to support growth and industrialization...
Computable general equilibrium Infrastructure Resource sectorWorking Paper
Special economic zones in Southern Africa: Is success influenced by design attributes?Special economic zones (SEZs) in Africa are generally regarded as underperforming relative to their peers in the rest of the world. This study focuses on the design features of the SEZ in Africa that may help explain this underperformance...
Design attributes Implementation InfrastructureBook Chapter
The construction sector in ZambiaFrom the book: Mining for Change
Industrialization Local content Economic linkagesBook Chapter
The construction sector in GhanaFrom the book: Mining for Change
Construction sector Price dynamics Expenditure shocksBook Chapter
Does construction limit investment?From the book: Mining for Change
Construction industries Infrastructure ProcurementWorking Paper
Roads and jobs in EthiopiaWe look at how improving roads can affect jobs and structural transformation...
Ethiopia Roads Structural transformationWorking Paper
The effects of the Maputo ring road on the quantity and quality of nearby housingUsing convolutional neural networks applied to satellite images covering a 25 km x 12 km rectangle on the northern outskirts of Greater Maputo, we detect and classify buildings from 2010 and 2018 in order to compare the development in quantity and qu...
Mozambique Infrastructure Impact evaluationWorking Paper
De-industrialization, re-industrialization, and the resurgence of state capitalism: The case of IndonesiaDiscussions on the developing world’s industrial policies have largely neglected the role of state-owned entities...
Industrialization Industrial policy InfrastructureWorking Paper
The role of the construction sector in influencing natural resource use, structural change, and industrial development in ZambiaThe construction sector plays a critical role in delivering quality infrastructure, which in turn influences the use of natural resource revenues towards achieving structural change and industrial development...
Construction sector Infrastructure Prices