Technical Change in African Industry

Recent debate on Africa's industrial development prospects emphasizes the critical importance of efforts to strengthen the technological capabilities of African enterprises. Unfortunately, there is as yet very little firm-level evidence on which to draw, particularly in comparison to scholarship on Latin American or Asian firms. In an attempt to respond to this gap, this article reviews a collection of case studies carried out by African researchers during the mid- to late 1980s with funding from the International Development Research Centre. The paper reviews the findings of the case studies with regard to the extent, nature and determinants of technical change in African manufacturing firms, and closes with a series of suggestions for future research in this area

Development economics · Development studies · Economic growth · Economics · Latin Americans · Political science · Scholarship · Economic Zones and Regional Development · Innovation and Socioeconomic Development · International Development and Aid