406. Why are natural resources a curse in Africa, but not elsewhere?

Fabrizio Carmignani and Abdur Chowdhury, School of Economics Discussion Paper No. 406, May 2010, School of Economics, The University of Queensland. Australia.

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Abstract

We study the nexus between natural resources and growth in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) and find that SSA is indeed special: resources dependence retards growth in SSA, but not elsewhere. The natural resources curse is thus specific to SSA. We then show that this specificity does not depend on the type of primary commodities on which SSA specializes. Instead, the SSA specificity appears to arise from the interaction between institutions and natural resources.