Regional trade and food security in SADC
Abstract A number of pertinent questions on regional trade and food security in southern Africa is addressed in this paper, namely: Should a country go it alone or should it belong to a regional trade bloc? Within the SADC region, should countries be content to be cereal importers? How can free trade be phased in? How can intra-SADC trade be expanded? Potentially sensitive agricultural products are listed and the sensitivity in grain milling and cereals is discussed in detail. The major conclusion is that trade in the region can contribute substantially to provide improved food security. There is also considerable scope for greater intra-regional trade in grain and other food products, and for greater cross-border investment in agriculture and agro-industry.
International Trade Effects of Regional Economic Integration In Africa: The Case of the Southern African Development Community (SADC)
Empirical studies on regional economic integration process in Africa exhibit sluggish progress, and there by limited level of intra-trade. The existing literature in Africa, particularly in the Southern African regional integration bloc, has neglected the effects of regional economic integration dealing with disaggregated data. This study analyzes trade creation and diversion effects of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) using disaggregated data. The investigation estimates an augmented gravity model using panel data and random effect estimator methods applying instrumental variables where needed. The results show that intra-SADC trade is growing in the fuel and minerals and the heavy manufacturing sectors while it displays a declining trend in the agricultural and light manufacturing sectors. This implies that SADC has displaced trade with the rest of the world in both fuel and minerals and the heavy manufacturing sectors. SADC has served to boost trade significantly among its members rather than with the rest of the world. Countries participating in SADC have moved toward a lower degree of relative openness with the rest of the world in these sectors of trade. However, the increasing trend of extra-SADC trade bias over the sample period in both the agricultural commodities and light manufacturing sectors means that there has been a negative trade diversion effect which implies that the value of trade between members and non-members has been increasing (and not falling as would be the case with trade diversion) for the two sectors. These results seem to suggest that SADC countries retained their openness and outward orientation despite signing the trade protocol for enhancing intra-SADC trade.
Deliberative Democracy and the Resource Curse: A Nationwide Experiment in Tanzania
Oil and gas discoveries in developing countries are often associated with short-sighted economic policies and, in response, calls to insulate resource management from populist impulses. We report on a randomized experiment testing methods to overcome this apparent tension between sound resource governance and democratic politics. Soon after Tanzania’s discovery of major natural gas reserves, we invited a nationally representative sample of voters to an intensive public deliberation of policy options featuring nationally recognized experts and small-group discussions. Democratic deliberation reinforced the public’s strong preference for rapid spending of gas revenues, but also increased support for various prudential and economically orthodox measures, including independent oversight of gas revenues, limits on government borrowing, and selling gas abroad rather than subsidizing fuel at home. These effects were driven by deliberation per se, rather than a pure information treatment, and show no evidence of contamination by facilitatoror peer-effects in group deliberations. www.cgdev.org Justin Sandefur, Nancy Birdsall, James Fishkin, and Mujobu Moyo