Economic Crisis in Sub-Saharan Africa: The International Dimension

Abstract

Sub-Saharan Africa's current economic problems stem from a complex mix, varying from country to country, of basic resource constraints, domestic mismanagement, and severe external shocks. Climate and natural resource endowments vary greatly. Some countries are severely constrained by a fragile and deteriorating environment, and perpetually dependent for shortterm prosperity upon the weather; others have fertile land, rich deposits of minerals, and/or abundant potential for hydroelectric power. All, however, are at relatively low levels of economic development. Even before the much publicized disasters of the 1980s, sub-Saharan Africa lagged behind most of the developing world in levels of per-capita income, development of social infrastructure, availability of education and health, and rate of economic growth. Twenty-nine sub-Saharan African countries are 'iDA-eligible,' qualifying by their poverty for the soft loans of the World Bank group. Twenty-two are categorized by the United Nations as among the least developed.' Many of the countries of this region are also very small, and all are experiencing extremely rapid rates of population growth. Global economic turbulence brought enormous external shocks to sub-Saharan Africa in the 1970s and 1980s. With some international assistance, the African countries managed, by and large, to 'ride through' the oil price increases and global recession in the 1974-6 period; between 1976 and 1979 their overall