africa

Africa at a Fork in the Road: Taking Off or Disappointment Once Again?
Just like other developing countries—not a few of them in Latin America—that did
well while the super cycle lasted, the African economies are about to be tested to an
extent not experienced in more than 30 years. If reduced demand and lower prices
for African commodities are followed by slower African growth, then it will be evident
that the recent growth has been riding mostly on the shoulders of other economies’
successes. If this proves to be the case, then most African nations will have only
two roads ahead: either to sink back into mediocre economic performance, with all
its negative social and political consequences, or to embark upon more profound
processes of reform to provide for other engines of economic growth that would
allow them to continue making progress on the social front.
Taking the bad road would be most unfortunate, considering that even the rapid
growth of the last 15 years has failed to create the jobs needed by the vast numbers
of unemployed in Africa. This problem would get much worse in a slower economy
considering, as Page does, that many millions of young people will be entering the
labor market each year in the immediate future. It is also unfortunate because the
continent still confronts extremely high poverty rates. As Ndikumana reminds us,
Sub-Saharan Africa is the only part of the world where the number of poor people
has continued to rise despite its GDP growth, and where income, gender, and
regional inequalities are not only stubbornly high but generally rising. As Thorbecke
points out, next to Latin America, Africa has the worst income distribution in the
world. To these unfortunate facts, Ncube adds that Africa’s record in pursuing the
Millennium Development Goals is mixed and that several of the key 2015 targets
are likely to be missed.
Frankly, despite the growth momentum gained in recent years, one cannot discount a
scenario of renewed disappointment about Africa’s development. As the international
conditions turn less propitious, the structural weaknesses that persist in most African
economies become more restrictive of their capacity to grow. As a number of authors
highlight and document forcefully in this volume, some of those weaknesses, far
from being solved, have become more acute over the recent period of fast growth.
The clearest, and most worrisome, expression of the continent’s structural weakness
is, as Mbaye and his co-authors stress in their contribution, the dualistic (formal and
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