从历史上看,工业化导致了城市化。工业化通常始于制造业需求的增长,这提供了更多的就业机会,并吸引了更多的人在工厂所在地定居。这样,城市化就从该地区开始,因为当工厂在一个地区定居时,它将吸引更多的劳动力,并且该地区的人们聚集导致该地区的城市化和繁荣。非洲是一个有趣的案例,因为它经历了工业化而没有导致城市化。在本文中,将讨论三个原因,以回答非洲为什么要工业化而不首先进行城市化的问题。
首先,非洲在城市化之前实现工业化的主要原因是其国家的地理位置。从历史上看,城市化与工业化之间有着紧密的关系。但是,这种相关性在发展中国家并未显示出很强的关系。有些国家正经历着快速的城市化进程,而没有适当的工业化,尤其是在那些资源丰富的国家中,这些国家正在成为资源出口国(Gollin,Jedwab和Vollrath,2016年)。一项研究将非洲制造业以外的工业的相对生产率与一些基准国家进行了比较,结果表明,即使在非洲那些资源不丰富的地方,自然资源也大大高于其他基准国家(Jedwab,2013年) )。这支持了先前的观点,即资源丰富的国家能够在城市化之前实现工业化。非洲之所以能够工业化,是因为它拥有丰富的自然资源,这为这些国家提供了成为出口国的绝好机会。与其他行业相比,成为出口商并不需要那么多的基础设施建设,这解释了与非洲内部较高的工业化率相比较低的城市化率。
其次,城市化通常伴随着复杂的制造业。然而,与其他国家相比,非洲大多数国家与制造业有关的情况略有不同。在过去的十年中,许多低收入国家通过产品和制造技能的多样化来实现快速增长。但是,非洲的产品复杂性一直在下降,尤其是在非洲的一些早期工业化国家中,例如肯尼亚,坦桑尼亚,加纳,赞比亚等(Page,2012年)。非洲人未能跟上其他低收入国家发展其高复杂性产品线的情况,导致其市场份额的丧失,并使它们与以前处于相对相对地位的其他国家相比,竞争力下降,这也导致非洲缓慢的城市化。结构性变化意味着从低生产率用途向高生产率用途的转变。在贫穷国家,结构性变化是导致经济增长的关键部分。经济增长是导致基础设施发展的关键。虽然非洲以低复杂度产品为中心,但其部分同时促进了经济增长和基础设施发展。非洲在高复杂度产品和低复杂度产品之间的差异最大(Page,2012年)。这表明非洲已经工业化,因为它生产的是低复杂度的产品,而没有城市化,因为该国的经济实力不足以支持城市化。
Historically, industrialization has led to urbanization. Industrialization normally begins with increasing manufacturing demand, which provides more job opportunities and attracts more people to settle in where the factories lie. In this way, urbanization starts in the area, as when factories are settled in one area, it draws more labor in and the gathering of people in the area leads to the urbanization and prosperity of the area. Africa is an interesting case, because it went through industrialization without it leading to urbanization. In this paper, three reasons will be discussed to answer the question that why Africa is industrializing without urbanizing first.First of all, the main reason behind Africa being industrialized before urbanized is due to its country’s positioning. Historically, there is a tight relationship between urbanization and industrialization. However, this correlation is not shown as strong in developing countries. There are countries that are experiencing rapid urbanization without proper industrialization, especially in countries with rich resources who are being a resource exporter (Gollin, Jedwab, and Vollrath, 2016). A study compared the relative productivity of industry other than manufacture in Africa with some benchmark countries, and it shows that the natural resources are significantly higher than other benchmark countries even in places in Africa that are not considered to be rich in resources (Jedwab, 2013). This backs up the earlier opinion that resource-rich countries are able to become industrialized before urbanized. Africa is able to become industrialized because it has rich natural resources, which provides the countries with the perfect opportunities to be an exporter. Being an exporter does not require as much as the infrastructure building compared to other industries, which explain the relatively low urbanization rate compared to its high industrialized rate within Africa.
Secondly, urbanization usually comes together with complex manufacture. However, situation regarding to manufacturing industry in most countries within Africa was a little bit different compared to other countries. Many low-income countries have been fast-growing in the past decade by diversifying their products and their manufacturing skills. However, Africa has been having a fall in their product complexity, especially in several of Africa’s early industrialized countries, such as Kenya, Tanzania, Ghana, Zambia and etc. (Page, 2012). The failure of African to keep out with other low-income countries to develop their high-complexity product line results in their loss of the market share and made them less competitive compared to other countries in the same relative position before, which also lead to their slow urbanization. A structural change means the shift of changing from low productivity uses to high productivity uses. In poor countries, a structural change is a critical part to lead to economic growth. And economic growth is key leading to infrastructure development. While Africa is centered around low-complexity products, which in part yield its economic growth and infrastructure development at the same time. Africa has the largest variance between high-complexity products and low-complexity products (Page, 2012). This suggests that Africa is industrialized because it is producing low-complexity products, but un-urbanized because the economy within the country is not strong enough to support urbanizing.
第三,这个问题背后的另一个原因是非洲的高生育率。非洲的10个国家中,大多数国家的生育率都高于世界平均水平,自1960年以来一直保持不变(Weller,2017)。公共卫生专家一直试图通过教育,避孕策略等来控制日益高的生育率,但即使没有能力抚养所有人,许多家庭仍然决定生育多个孩子(Weller,2017 )。最终,该城市无法容纳该地区的原住民或新出生的居民,包括从周围农村地区移居该地区的居民。这也导致高失业率,从而使本来就脆弱的地区陷入更加危险的境地。此外,所有低收入国家通常都在某种程度上缺乏官僚力量。在非洲,企业家精神相对较低,这取决于政府实施此类产业政策,这也可能导致权力滥用等(Stiglitz等,2017)。这样,不完善的产业政策以及缺乏更好的实施政策的能力也助长了当前形势。
对我们而言,关心非洲内部正在发生的事情非常重要,因为非洲是一个充满机遇和潜力的大陆。上个世纪,全球工业化市场经历了重大变化,越来越多的业务转移到发展中国家。非洲已经经历了工业化和去工业化,这表明它具有充分的工业化潜力。如果真是这样,那么对非洲内部的经济学进行分析就成为预测未来全球趋势和机遇的重要途径。另一方面,与非洲的城市化率相比,我们必须注意非洲的工业化率,因为从过去的情况来看,这是一个危险的信号。当一个国家的工业化程度大大提高,但城市化程度还不够高时,它就缺少了支持该国目前人口和可能迁入该国的潜在持续人口的关键基础设施。基本的基础设施包括桥梁,房屋,道路,公共交通等。如果没有这些供应,就无法跟上该国人口的增长,这将使该国陷入脆弱的局面,就像现在非洲所发生的那样。例如,尼日利亚的拉各斯就是一个很好的例子,可以展示非洲许多其他国家所面临的挑战。在2000年,拉各斯的人口为720万,仅排在中等脆弱的名单上。但是,在2015年,拉各斯的人口急剧增加至1,790万。经济学家预测,到2050年,这个数字可能会翻倍。与2000年相比,拉各斯的大量人口流入使这座城市变得更加脆弱(Weller,2017年)。
Thirdly, another reason that lies behind this issue is the high fertility rate in Africa. Most of the 10 countries in Africa have higher than average fertility rate in the world and this has been staying the same since 1960 (Weller, 2017). The public health experts have been trying to control the increasingly high fertility rate through education, contraception strategies and etc., but many families still decide to have multiple children, even when they do not have the ability to raise all of them (Weller, 2017). Eventually, the city cannot handle the number of residents who was native or newly born to the area, including those who move to the area from surrounding rural places. This also caused the high unemployment rate, which in turn put the already fragile area into a more dangerous situation. In addition, all countries at a low-income normally lack the bureaucratic power in some way. And in Africa, with the relatively low entrepreneurship, it is depended on the government to implement industrial policies like these, which could also lead to abuse of power and etc. (Stiglitz et al., 2017). In this way, the imperfect industrial policy and the lack of ability to implement a better one also contributed to the current situation.It is important for us to care about what is going on within Africa, because it is a continent that is full of opportunities and potential. The global industrialization market has been going through major changes in the past century, where the more and more business has been shifting into developing countries. Africa has been through industrialization and de-industrialization, which indicates that it has full potential to be industrialized. If that is the case, then analyzing the economics within Africa becomes crucial important as a way to foresee future global trends and opportunities. On the other side, it is important for us to pay attention to African’s industrialization rate compared to its urbanization rate because from past cases, this is a dangerous sign. When a country is far more industrialized but not urbanized enough, then it is missing critical basic infrastructure to support the present population in the country and the potential ongoing population that may move into the country. Basic infrastructures include bridges, housing, roads, public transportation and etc. Without these supplies cannot keep up with the growing population in the country, it would lead the country into a fragile situation, like what is happening in Africa now. For example, Lagos in Nigeria is a great case to showcase the challenges that’s faced by many other countries in Africa. In 2000, Lagos has a population of 7.2 million, which only put it on the moderately fragile list. However, in 2015, Lagos’ population increased drastically to 17.9 million. And the economists predicted that it could double that number by 2050. The vast inflow of population into Lagos has made the city far more fragile compared to how it was in year 2000 (Weller, 2017).
References:
Gollin. D; Jedwab. R and Vollrath. D, (2016), Urbanization with and without industrialization, Journal of Economic Growth, 21, (1), 35-70
Jedwab, R, (2013). “Urbanization without Structural Transformation: Evidence from Consumption Cities in Africa,” mimeo. George Washington University.
Page, J. 2012. “Can Africa Industrialize?” Journal of African Economics, Vol.21, AERC Supplement 2, pp. ii86-ii125.
Stiglitz, J. Y., Lin, J. Y., Zhao, C. Y., Zhang, X. Y., Page, J. Y., Lee, K., … Shimeles, A. (2017). Industrialize Africa: Strategies, Policies, Institutions and financing. Retrieved from https://www.afdb.org/fileadmin/uploads/afdb/Documents/GenericDocuments/industrialize_africa_reportstrategies_policies_institutions_and_financing.PDF
Weller, C. (2017, October 25). Some African countries are 'urbanizing before they industrialize' and it could be devastating for future populations. Retrieved from https://www.businessinsider.com/urbanization-in-africa-latin-america-is-putting-populations-at-risk-2017-10.
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