Suchergebnisse

The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) under the auspices of the Chinese government was created as a regional integration and development model between China and her trade partners. Arguments have been raised as to whether this initiative will be beneficial to participating countries in the long run. We set to examine how to estimate this trade initiative by comparing the relative estimation powers of the traditional gravity model with the neural network analysis using detailed bilateral trade exports data from 1990 to 2017. The results show that neural networks are better than the gravity model approach in learning and clarifying international trade estimation. The neural networks with fixed country effects showed a more accurate estimation compared to a baseline model with country-year fixed effects, as in the OLS estimator and Poisson pseudo-maximum likelihood. On the other hand, the analysis indicated that more than 50% of the 6 participating East African countries in the BRI were able to attain their predicted targets. Kenya achieved an 80% (4 of 5) target. Drawing from the lessons of the BRI and the use of neural network model, it will serve as an important reference point by which other international trade interventions could be measured and compared.

This study provides an empirical assessment of infrastructure and inclusive growth in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). An inclusive growth index has been constructed and then used to test the infrastructure–inclusive growth nexus. The study has also examined whether infrastructure has a distributive impact on income groups. The overall analysis employed panel data collected from 31 SSA countries over the period 2003–17. The study found a positive link between infrastructure and inclusive growth. These results were significant for energy, transport and information and communications technology (ICT) infrastructures. It was also found that poorer people gain more benefits from the listed infrastructures than the rich, which shows that infrastructure plays an important role in the distribution of income. The overall results imply that infrastructure is vital in reducing income disparities and enhancing shared prosperity in SSA. Policies for increasing access and affordability of infrastructure services are highly recommended to promote inclusion.