Correlates of human development in Africa: Evidence across gender and income group

Abstract

Gender inequality is high in Africa compared to other regions of the world. This disparity jeopardises the efforts targeted at improving human development and economic growth in the continent. This study provides empirical evidence on the drivers of human development in Africa across gender and country income groups, covering 54 countries over the period 1990 to 2019. It employed the Mean Group estimator for analysis to accommodate slope heterogeneity and cross-sectional dependence. The paper used Human Development Index (HDI) to proxy human development, while HDI across gender was employed to capture gender differences in human development. Country income grouping followed the World Bank country classification into low, lower-middle and upper-middle-income economies. The findings showed more determinants of HDI when disaggregated across gender than otherwise. The drivers of HDI are similar across gender for each country income group, with infrastructure, particularly ICT shown to have a positive effect in the long run for all country groups. For lower-middle and upper-middle income countries, fertility rate induced a significant negative effect on HDI and gender human development but only in the long run. However, the effect was insignificant for male and female HDI in low-income countries. Moreover, an increase in real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) promotes human development regardless of a country's income classification. A larger positive effect of GDP was observed on the HDI for low-income countries. Therefore, in the bid to improve human development in Africa, efforts should continually be intensified towards promoting GDP growth regardless of the level of growth in macroeconomic income. Policies targeted at reducing fertility rates and increasing ICT are also encouraged as these will improve HDI and close the gap in HDI across gender.