Economic Geography and Economic Development in Sub-Saharan Africa
研究了1993-2009年间撒哈拉以南非洲国家市场准入对收入差异的影响，发现市场准入对经济发展有稳健的正向作用，且近十年重要性增加，尤其是进入其他非洲市场。
Sub-Saharan Africa's (SSA) physical geography is often blamed for its poor economic performance. A country's geographical location does, however, not only determine its agricultural conditions or disease environment. It also pins down a country's relative position vis-à-vis other countries, affecting its ease of access to foreign markets. This paper assesses the importance of market access for manufactures in explaining the observed income differences between SSA countries over the period 1993–2009. We construct yearly, theory-based measures of each SSA country's market access using the information contained in bilateral manufacturing trade flows. Using these measures, we find a robust positive effect of market access on economic development that has increased in importance during the last decade. Interestingly, when further unraveling this finding, access to other SSA markets in particular turns out to be important.