An African Perspective on Economic Development

From an op/ed in Friday's Financial Times by Paul Kagame, the president of Rwanda ("Africa has to find its own road to prosperity"):

[A]s I tell our people, nobody owes Rwandans anything. Why should anyone in Rwanda feel comfortable that taxpayers in other countries are contributing money for our well­being or development? Rwanda is a nation with high goals and a sense of purpose. We are attempting to increase our gross domestic product by seven times over a generation, which increases per capita incomes fourfold. This will create the basis for further innovation and foster trust, civic-mindedness and tolerance, strengthening our society.

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Entrepreneurship is the surest way for a nation to meet these goals. Government activities should focus on supporting entrepreneurship not just to meet these new goals, but because it unlocks people’s minds, fosters innovation and enables people to exercise their talents. If people are shielded from the forces of competition, it is like saying they are disabled.

Entrepreneurship gives people the feeling that they are valued and have meaning, that they are as capable, as competent and as gifted as anyone else.

The rest of Mr. Kagame's column is worth reading. In it, he refers to the ideas of an economist we've mentioned here before, Dambisa Moyo.

A quick check of Wikipedia suggests that Kagame had a long, eventful (and somewhat controversial) military career before entering politics. This year, Kagame was included in Time Magazine's list of the world's 100 most influential people. His entry was authored by the mega church pastor Rick Warren, who wrote (in part),

Kagame's leadership has a number of uncommon characteristics. One is his willingness to listen to and learn from those who oppose him. When journalist Stephen Kinzer was writing a biography of Kagame, the President gave him a list of his critics and suggested that Kinzer could discover what he was really like by interviewing them. Only a humble yet confident leader would do that. Then there is Kagame's zero tolerance for corruption. Rwanda is one of the few countries where I've never been asked for a bribe. Any government worker caught engaging in corruption is publicly exposed and dealt with. That is a model for the entire country — and the rest of the world too.

The photo above, of President Kagame shaking hands with President Bush in the White House in 2006, is from Wikipedia.

More on Moyo

In a post last month ("An African Economist on Western Aid to Africa"), we mentioned the Zambian-born economist and author Dambisa Moyo, and posted an excerpt from the interview with her in the Financial Times. Today's New York Times Magazine features an interview with Moyo as well ("Questions for Dambisa Moyo -- The Anti-Bono"). From the interview:

Q: As a native of Zambia with advanced degrees in public policy and economics from Harvard and Oxford, you are about to publish an attack on Western aid to Africa and its recent glamorization by celebrities. ‘‘Dead Aid,’’ as your book is called, is particularly hard on rock stars. Have you met Bono?
I have, yes, at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last year. It was at a party to raise money for Africans, and there were no Africans in the room, except for me.

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You argue in your book that Western aid to Africa has not only perpetuated poverty but also worsened it, and you are perhaps the first African to request in book form that all development aid be halted within five years.
Think about it this way — China has 1.3 billion people, only 300 million of whom live like us, if you will, with Western living standards. There are a billion Chinese who are living in substandard conditions. Do you know anybody who feels sorry for China? Nobody.

Maybe that’s because they have so much money that we here in the U.S. are begging the Chinese for loans.
Forty years ago, China was poorer than many African countries. Yes, they have money today, but where did that money come from? They built that, they worked very hard to create a situation where they are not dependent on aid.

The photo above, of Ms. Mayo, accompanied Deborah Solomon's interview.

An African Economist on Western Aid to Africa

In a recent post ("The UN High Commissioner of Refugees Imitates The Onion"), we mentioned the NYU development economist William Easterly, who has been critical of traditional Western approaches to providing aid to Africa and other parts of the developing world. Coincidentally, today's Lunch with the FT interview in the Financial Times is with a Zambian-born economist, Dambisa Moyo, who seems to share Easterly's disdain of traditional aid approaches ("Lunch with the FT: Dambisa Moyo"). In fact, Moyo says that African countries would be better off if they were given a warning that foreign aid would be cut off in five years, and were forced to seek funds from the bond market instead. Moyo argues that bond investors would impose a discipline on African governments that aid donors so far haven't. Herewith, a few brief excerpts:

[A]s the historian Niall Ferguson (a contributing editor to the FT), notes in a foreword to Moyo’s book, she is venturing into a debate that has to date been colonised by white men – be they rock stars such as Bono, politicians such as Tony Blair or the academics Jeffrey Sachs and Bill Easterly.

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So what of the rock and Hollywood stars, who have appointed themselves advocates of making poverty history? She is withering: “Most Brits would be irritated if Michael Jackson started offering advice on how to resolve the credit crisis. Americans would be put out if Amy Winehouse went to tell them how to end the housing crisis. I don’t see why Africans shouldn’t be perturbed for the same reasons,” she replies

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We finish with a coffee. Moyo’s book ends on an equally energising note, that of an African proverb: “The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago. The second-best time is now.”