Tyler Cowen at Bloomberg Opinion:
Nigeria, South Africa and Ethiopia were supposed to be the economic engines of an entire continent, but conditions in all three countries have recently taken a turn for the worse.
One of the saddest stories of the year has gone largely unreported: the slowdown of political and economic progress in sub-Saharan Africa. There is no longer a clear path for how the world’s poorest continent might claw its way up to middle-income status. Africa has amazing human talent and brilliant cultural heritages, but its major political centers are, to put it bluntly, falling apart.
Three countries are more geopolitically central than the others: Ethiopia, with a population of 118 million; Nigeria, which has the most people, 212 million, and the largest gross domestic product; and South Africa, population 60 million, the region’s wealthiest nation and the central economic and political presence in the southern part of the continent. Within the last two years, all three have fallen into very serious trouble.
In Ethiopia a civil war is worsening by the day. Recently, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize two years ago, called for all eligible citizens to enter the armed forces. That is a sign of desperation, not imminent resolution of the conflict. Abiy had promised a rapid victory, but in June the Tigrayan forces won some battles against the national Ethiopian army, taking over significant parts of the country. It is not clear what will happen next.
Until the recent conflict, Ethiopia was enjoying years of double digit economic growth, unprecedented in modern African history. The country’s industrial policy and economic reforms were considered marvels for other developing nations to emulate. The good news has been overwhelmed by longstanding ethnic conflicts that have broken out into the open.
In Nigeria the country’s politics clearly are moving backwards. There is a longstanding rebellion in the northeast, a business shutdown in the southeast, and a notable increase in kidnappings for ransom. A Council for Foreign Relations publication describes a “growing separatism.”
The rise in kidnappings is alarming, but it is also a broader sign of the weakness of the national government. The true number of abductions remains unreported. On the economic front, Nigeria just exited its second recession in four years, and growth has not exceeded 3% since 2015.
As for South Africa, a recent New Yorker article noted that “Mandela’s dream” is “in ruins” and spoke of the “mob violence” that is “threatening the country’s constitutional order.” Some 40,000 businesses have been looted, vandalized or burned in the worst violence since the end of apartheid. South Africa also has been experiencing major Covid waves and lockdowns. The unemployment rate is 33%, not counting those who have stopped looking for work.
These three countries were supposed to be the economic engines of an entire continent that, according to the United Nations, will be home to some 2.5 billion people by 2050, or a quarter of the world’s population. Now their economies are ailing. And while South Africa is making some strides in holding former President Jacob Zuma accountable, it’s hard to say these countries are political models for stable democratization....
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If interested see also:Why Africa Has Found It So Difficult To Industrialize
"Agriculture in Africa will rise to $1 trillion"
Spears' Magazine on Africa
And a few of our prior posts
January 2020
"African economies will outperform global growth in 2020 despite a lag from its biggest countries"
October 2017
Needed: 800 Million Jobs For Africa
By now most of our readers have seen a version of the U.N. projections
for world population in 2050 and 2100. If not, here's a post from April
with the graphic:
IMF: Sub-Saharan Africa has Just Completed One of its Best Decades of Growth--It's Not Enough (UPDATED)
Update below.
Original post:
This may be one of the more important graphics you are likely to come across today.
Africa's population is projected by the United Nations to reach 2
billion people by 2045, 4 billion before the end of the century:
We followed up with "To Jumpstart Development, Should We Give Africa Bonds a Whirl?"
The problem, as always, is keeping the money from sticking to the hands of the kleptocrats,And today it's the population analysts at Populyst, September 28:
And whether investment will actually do any good.
Following on "IMF: Sub-Saharan Africa has Just Completed One of its Best Decades of Growth--It's Not Enough" here are a couple women who have thought about this stuff, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala a former two-time Finance Minister of Nigeria and World Bank Managing Director, currently a senior advisor at Lazard and Nancy Birdsall, former EVP at the Inter-American Development Bank where she ran a $30 billion loan portfolio....
Africa: 800 Million Jobs Needed
African economies are in a race to get ahead of the demographic boom.....MORE
Up to 500 Million Sub-Saharan Africans Would Like to Move to Europe; Mayfair, Monte Carlo Favored
