Private Enterprise-Led Development in Sub-Saharan Africa provides a novel theoretical and conceptual model to guide research into Africa's economic development. It endorses the view that private enterprise-led growth will help reduce poverty since it strengthens individuals' capacity to care for themselves and their families.

This book explores what is, for many African countries, a new and controversial policy of relying on private actors rather than on government organizations to foster economic growth and development. The contributors explore key issues such as the impact of private enterprise on the development process, small- and medium-sized businesses as a vehicle for growth, and strategies for the expansion of markets and trade. The contributors analyze the historical, social, cultural, and economic obstacles to the development of private enterprise in Africa; the roles of government, women, and business organizations; access to capital and the function of financial institutions; private initiative and agriculture; the use of skilled and semi-skilled labor; and technology transfer. Arguing that private sector forces are crucial to African socioeconomic development, the contributors recommend economic policy reform, establishment of more private enterprises, and encouragement of new domestic and foreign investment.

This book examines key determinants of private sector development in West Africa, putting special emphasis on government’s cardinal role in fostering and supporting entrepreneurship. Favorable macroeconomic conditions are identified and it is shown that adequate policies that contribute to economic diversification and industrialization are likely to expand the investment base of the economy. The book also examines new business concepts and regional integration initiatives meant to enhance West Africa’s private sector and analyzes the role of finance in promoting development of private firms and the extent to which corruption impedes economic growth. All chapters are highly relevant to West Africa’s current policy challenges and therefore inform the region’s ongoing policy formulation. The empirical evidence supporting the policy recommendations is based on both qualitative field observations and advanced quantitative estimation techniques.

Why is the private sector yet to take off in much sub-Saharan Africa? Drawing on a unique set of enterprise surveys, Vijaya Ramachandran and her co-authors identify the biggest obstacles: inadequate infrastructure (especially unreliable electricity and crumbing roads) and burdensome regulation. They then show how ethnic minorities dominate the private sector in many countries, inhibiting competition and demands for a better business environment, and thus impeding the emergence of an entrepreneurial middle class. Based on this careful diagnosis, the authors suggest investing in infrastructure and reforming regulation to lower the cost of doing business, and increasing the access to education of a broader-based business class that crosses ethnic divides. Book jacket.

This contributed volume examines development efforts in sub-Saharan Africa and the role privatization and foreign investment can play. The focus is on African and international capital mobility and recent experience in private investment in contemporary African states. While government in Africa continues to have a hand in economic and political matters, private enterprise, private investment, and market forces are becoming increasingly active. The volume reveals these new directions in development practice in Africa and analyzes the difficulties which government, while well-intended, has created in the past. Contributors from the United States and Africa pose questions and examine scenarios for investment in sub-Saharan Africa. And while no single strategy is agreed upon, they provide overwhelming evidence that it has been the failure of prior central policies which has held these nations back, and that hope for the 1990's lies in the unleashing of the private sector. This work will be of interest to scholars and policy-makers in development economics, international trade and finance, and African studies.

Africa is the world’s poorest continent, but amid all the bad news, there is hope for change. This pamphlet examines the lessons to be learned from some of the more successful economies south of the Sahara, and discusses a policy framework to promote sustainable economic growth and reduce poverty across the region.

Expectations are high regarding the potential benefits of public-private partnerships (PPPs) for infrastructure development in low-income countries. The development community, led by the G20, the United Nations, and others, expects these partnerships between goverments and private companies in infrastructure service provision to aid "transformational" mega-projects, as well as efforts to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals. Yet PPPs have been widely used only since the 1990s, and discussion of their efficacy is still dominated by best-practice guidance, academic studies that focus on developed countries, or ideological criticism. Meanwhile, practitioners have quietly accumulated a large body of empirical evidence on the actual performance of PPPs. The purpose of this book is to summarize and consolidate what this critical mass of evidence-based research indicates about PPPs in low-income countries, and thereby develop a more realistic perspective on the practical value of these mechanisms. With a primary focus on Sub-Saharan Africa, though drawing on critical insights from other regions, it demonstrates that the benefits of such partnerships will only be realised if expectations remain modest and projects are subject to transparent evaluation and competition.