the untapped resource is of course raw labor power
the various sub saharan regimes need to build
export production zones EPZs
ala china in the 80's
task
grab pieces of the global production chain
by selling the labor power necessary to lure in MNCs
okay
the exchange ratte has to be fiddled
the ground rent rebated and the wages subsidized
but a careful caculation i suspect will reveal this is a very high return investment
coastal proximity seems essential
land locked nations might look into lebor intensive but non skill intensive production processes too
but transport in and out looks to be a tough call unless trans national container rail gets cooking downb there i note recently the emphasis in china has developed two paths
for the interior activate latent labor power
but on the coast
drive for higher per hour value added
the chinese industrial sector (IS)
has about the same value added as the US IS
but where we have what 12 million workers in our IS they have 100 million
now part of that is the outcome
of two hugely different
product profiles
ours greatly fixed investment intensive
theirs far more labor intensive
--even if they dbrought their processes up to global frontier labor productivity levels ---
but the distance between present coastal methods and world class methods is still considerable

inland however a huge untapped population exists
that even if paid a quarter of coastal wages
would be a big social gain
the task is to build into these interior regions an adequate transportation communication and energy infra structure
another possible gum up

not clear to me
how mobile coastal middle mangement is willing
to be
transfered to bug tussle inner mongolia ?
that agenda stinks of corporate meddling

"Africa’s recent record on economic growth, democracy and governance"
goo goos fall for this crap

governance is simply
code for
make local resource and labor exploitation
safe for MNCs
how does democracy
that wondrous sounding word
spell
danger ?

most african nations today
would be far better off
led by a pro peoples state party
that had unchallenged power
then
one of these walnut shell
n party shuffle board operations
so beloved of liberal amerikans
and as to growth
what sort of growth ?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potos%C3%AD
follow this link for an apropos parable
"no central focus of African development"
that is by design of course
the mediations must be by the metropole states
attempts in asia and latin america to set up direct intra regional lines of trade
face lots of MNC resistence
hurricane hugo has created quite a nuisance by pushing this important regional self organizing
if the various emerging nations are not to be played off against each other
they need to co ordinate their colletive posture
toward the MNCs and international finance

ReplyWednesday, June 20, 2012 at 08:00 AM

paine said in reply to paine...

back in the late 70's i looked into all this with a bit more care
lots has changed since then obviously
but of one thing i'm sure small nation states can't get far using import substitution
despite the obvious hazrds of
mono cultural exploitation
of their agrian hinterlands
this can be a source of ground rent
if the state handles it right
and only after securing the traditional subsistence sector by a very radical land reform
btw
anti corruption campaigns
usually culminate in something far worse
that i take as a maxim of policy

ReplyWednesday, June 20, 2012 at 08:05 AM

paine said in reply to paine...

though i'm agin mass higher ed here
emerging states have a big export product in low cost high talent brains
a very aggressive search for this talent ougha be job one
given the low "capital costs " involved
btw
this "western" Democracy
like India
is a great contrast
to party state china ..eh ?
the land issue plagues china today too
and corruption of course
plus
chronic traditional peasant "redundancy"
urban human catch basins
rampant pollutingschool thru say 6th grade prolly improves chances of a "real" job
not that 6 years of schooling
in all or even most
of those jobs
is required for those jobs
recall
in dickensian england
industrialization pre dated
mass public education
point ?
even a state party embedded in popular mass aspirations
can't trigger an industrial take off
induistrial development is primary
and access to global markets for industrial products
---uinlike raw commodities---
is primarily controled
by the great MNCs
kenya wil find it fairly easy
to get MNCs
to "develop" resource extraction related infrastructure
but its own industrial infrastructure
will only come when MNCs choose to use kenya as a production base in the international production chain
china has a national core still motivated by national industrial goals
kenya has opportunists ready to "treat" and contract
with MNCs even before stablizing a basic developmental autonomy
hurricane huge has barged
into this dilemma lately
my point of reference is Eritrea
which has nothing natural the MNCs want
i pose its state party's
main development tasks to myself
every nite b4 i fall to sleep
and go
argh !

ReplyTuesday, June 19, 2012 at 06:31 AM

paine said in reply to paine...

what truth is most galling
you really have to produce for global markets
AND building complete product systems
is secondary
the 50's industrial import substitution template
sine qua non
is a potential retardent
to small nation development
reason
the national industry has no easy or assured access
to global markets and to the fully contemporary production scales only that access can validate
becoming part of the international production chain is crucial
how do you do that while retaining control
of industrial development ?
ask daniel ortega abou that

ReplyTuesday, June 19, 2012 at 06:42 AM

paine said in reply to paine...

americans like to forget
our own industrial development
in its first 50 years
relied in large part on the exportsback
to europe
of products of chattel slave labor
and the fruits of native forests of course
before that
as we all know here in Mass
before opium to china
barrel staves and sailing ships
built to contain and carry
the products of slave plantations
and the slaves themselves
were a big part
of new england's first industrial development

the very typical bourgeois focus on corruption
simply avoids the bigger problems
like access to markets credit and technology
like the multi national corporate domination of the commanding heights of the global economy
either directly or thru neo liberal corporate "friendly" international public agencies
corruption was urban amerika's middle name
during the heroic era
1866 to 1930
de facto landlordism btw is not
primarily corruption
its simply pre legal urban frontier
might makes right
but what is import
is indeed
a grotesquely parasitical tax on honest toilers
squatter title is at least a path beyond
that primal stage of civilization