This book presents empirical analyses of manufacturing firm performance in Africa based on the World Bank Enterprise Survey and on a one-time quantitative survey conducted for the World Bank by the Center for the Study of African Economies of Oxford University.

Recent growth accelerations in Africa are characterized by increasing productivity in agriculture, a declining share of the labor force employed in agriculture and declining productivity in modern sectors such as manufacturing. To shed light on this puzzle, we disaggregate firms in the manufacturing sector by size using two newly created panels of manufacturing firms, one for Tanzania covering 2008-2016 and one for Ethiopia covering 1996-2017. Our analysis reveals a dichotomy between larger firms that exhibit superior productivity performance but do not expand employment much, and small firms that absorb employment but do not experience any productivity growth. We suggest the poor employment performance of large firms is related to use of capital-intensive techniques associated with global trends in technology.

Why is there so little industry in Africa? Over the past forty years, industry has moved from the developed to the developing world, yet Africa’s share of global manufacturing has fallen from about 3 percent in 1970 to less than 2 percent in 2014. Industry is important to low-income countries. It is good for economic growth, job creation, and poverty reduction. Made in Africa: Learning to Compete in Industry outlines a new strategy to help African industry compete in global markets. This book draws on case studies and econometric and qualitative research from Africa and emerging Asia to understand what drives firm-level competitiveness in low-income countries. The results show that while traditional concerns such as infrastructure, skills, and the regulatory environment are important, they alone will not be sufficient for Africa to industrialize. The book also addresses how industrialization strategies will need to adapt to the region’s growing resource abundance.

Performance of Manufacturing Firms in Africa: An Empirical Analysis sheds light on the characteristics of formal and informal manufacturing firms in Africa by comparing these firms with firms in other regions. Drawing on two data sources, the authors find that there is a very low share of manufacturing in GDP in Africa and in African exports. Most African manufacturing firms are informal, perhaps because the enforcement of registration and licensing regulations is not strict. These firms are also smaller than firms in other regions and few export. Labor productivity is low in Africa relative to other regions, but this may be because of the more challenging environment—with the lack of physical infrastructure, the heavy burden of business regulation, and other issues. However, after accounting for these differences, the authors find that firms in Sub-Saharan Africa appear more, not less, productive than firms elsewhere. This analysis suggests that improving the business environment might allow firms to enhance their performance. However, given the pervasive distortions in the business environment and the limited resources at the disposal of most African countries, Africa cannot and should not wait until the business environment becomes healthier before growing a more viable manufacturing sector. Performance of Manufacturing Firms in Africa: An Empirical Analysis shows that binding constraints vary by country, by sector, and by firm size. Therefore, countries should identify the constraints in the most promising sectors and adopt policies designed specifically to remove these constraints. The evidence in this book overwhelmingly dispels the false notion of Africa’s inability to compete globally in manufacturing goods. This book will be of interest to economists, policy makers, and government officials working to improve manufacturing firm performance in Africa.

Improving Manufacturing Performance in South Africa

"The series is sponsored by the Agence Francaise de Developpement and the World Bank."

New technologies are revolutionising the way manufacturing and supply chain management are implemented. These changes are delivering manufacturing firms the competitive advantage of a highly flexible and responsive supply chain and manufacturing system to ensure that they meet the high expectations of their customers, who, in today's economy, demand absolutely the best service, price, delivery time and product quality.To make e-manufacturing and supply chain technologies effective, integration is needed between various, often disparate systems. To understand why this is such an issue, one needs to understand what the different systems or system components do, their objectives, their specific focus areas and how they interact with other systems. It is also required to understand how these systems evolved to their current state, as the concepts used during the early development of systems and technology tend to remain in place throughout the life-cycle of the systems/technology. This book explores various standards, concepts and techniques used over the years to model systems and hierarchies in order to understand where they fit into the organization and supply chain. It looks at the specific system components and the ways in which they can be designed and graphically depicted for easy understanding by both information technology (IT) and non-IT personnel.Without a good implementation philosophy, very few systems add any real benefit to an organization, and for this reason the ways in which systems are implemented and installation projects managed are also explored and recommendations are made as to possible methods that have proven successful in the past. The human factor and how that impacts on system success are also addressed, as is the motivation for system investment and subsequent benefit measurement processes.Finally, the vendor/user supply/demand within the e-manufacturing domain is explored and a method is put forward that enables the reduction of vendor bias during the vendor selection process.The objective of this book is to provide the reader with a good understanding regarding the four critical factors (business/physical processes, systems supporting the processes, company personnel and company/personal performance measures) that influence the success of any e-manufacturing implementation, and the synchronization required between these factors.· Discover how to implement the flexible and responsive supply chain and manufacturing execution systems required for competitive and customer-focused manufacturing· Build a working knowledge of the latest plant automation, manufacturing execution systems (MES) and supply chain management (SCM) design techniques· Gain a fuller understanding of the four critical factors (business and physical processes, systems supporting the processes, company personnel, performance measurement) that influence the success of any e-manufacturing implementation, and how to evaluate and optimize all four factors

Africa’s Development Dynamics uses lessons learned in the continent’s five regions – Central, East, North, Southern and West Africa – to develop policy recommendations and share good practices. Drawing on the most recent statistics, this analysis of development dynamics attempts to help African leaders reach the targets of the African Union’s Agenda 2063 at all levels: continental, regional, national and local.

The African manufacturing sector continues to face many problems as it struggles to progress from its presently underdeveloped state. If the countries that make up Africa are ever to raise the living standards of the vast majority of its population to a more acceptable level, then the economic growth that would result from an enlarged and improved manufacturing sector may hold an important key. The book provides a useful source of greater understanding of African manufacturing firms and the perplexing lack of widespread industrial growth during the post-colonial decades. The comprehensive coverage includes such themes as: *the size and distribution of firms in Africa *entrepreneurship, labour and the regulatory and business environments in Africa *the dynamic problem of growth and investment of firms Any reader wanting to understand the economic problems of Africa will need to read this book, and any student, academic or policy-maker working in the areas of development and industrial economics will find it to be a most useful guide.