Shifting Wealth: Recommendations for the Future

According to the 2010 Perspectives on Global Development: Shifting Wealth, by the OECD Development Centre, the economic and financial crisis is accelerating a longer-term structural transformation in the global economy. In fact, longer-term forecasts in the Report suggest that today’s developing and emerging countries are likely to account for nearly 60% of world GDP by 2030.  

These findings should indeed transform the way we configure ourselves in Africa especially with the key economic engines of the world; China and India. 
To this end, the Report makes useful recommendations below with regard to development strategies in developing countries, which need to be adapted to harness the opportunities of shifting wealth. 

National development policies should:

● promote South-South foreign direct investment and learning the lessons from successful examples of clusters and Export Processing Zones. They should harness investment links to achieve technological upgrading through national innovation systems;

● ensure appropriate revenue management policies in resource-rich economies and consider using sovereign wealth funds to smooth consumption and channel resources to promote growth and investment in the domestic economy;

● respond to the growing demand for agricultural exports and increasing pressure on arable land by strategies to improve agricultural productivity, through greater support to R&D and extension services, and through South-South technological transfer;

● implement pro-poor growth policies, focusing on providing more and better jobs and improving social protection through further development and replication of institutional innovations such as conditional cash transfers;

● expand South-South peer learning to help design policy based on successful experiences in the South.

A shift from predominantly North-South cooperation to predominantly South South (African and non African) cooperation especially with india and china may require a shift in foreign policy for some African countries. However, that shift is not only necessary but crucial.