From Mines and Wells to Well-Built Minds : Turning Sub-Saharan Africa's Natural Resource Wealth into Human Capital

Sub-Saharan Africa's natural resource-rich countries have poor human development. Children in these countries are more likely to die before their first birthday, more likely to be stunted, and less likely to attend school than children in other countries with similar income. Despite the curre...

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Main Authors:	de la Brière, Bénédicte, Filmer, Deon, Ringold, Dena, Rohner, Dominic, Samuda, Karelle, Denisova, Anastasiya
Format:	Book
Language:	English en_US
Published:	World Bank, Washington, DC 2017
Subjects:	RESOURCE RENTS EDUCATION HUMAN CAPITAL INSTITUTIONS HUMAN DEVELOPMENT CASH TRANSFERS GOVERNANCE INFORMATION EXTRACTIVES EARLY CHILD DEVELOPMENT INCENTIVES
Online Access:	http://hdl.handle.net/10986/26490

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recordtype	oai_dc
spelling	okr-10986-264902021-04-23T14:04:36Z From Mines and Wells to Well-Built Minds : Turning Sub-Saharan Africa's Natural Resource Wealth into Human Capital de la Brière, Bénédicte Filmer, Deon Ringold, Dena Rohner, Dominic Samuda, Karelle Denisova, Anastasiya RESOURCE RENTS EDUCATION HUMAN CAPITAL INSTITUTIONS HUMAN DEVELOPMENT CASH TRANSFERS GOVERNANCE INFORMATION EXTRACTIVES EARLY CHILD DEVELOPMENT INCENTIVES Sub-Saharan Africa's natural resource-rich countries have poor human development. Children in these countries are more likely to die before their first birthday, more likely to be stunted, and less likely to attend school than children in other countries with similar income. Despite the current price downturn, extractives will remain an important part of Sub-Saharan Africa's growth story—using resource rents wisely remains a long term challenge. Governments must choose how to allocate resource rents between spending, investing in human or physical capital, or investing in global financial assets. The return to investing in physical and human capital will be high in countries where the capital stock is low. Moreover, higher levels of human capital make investments in physical capital more productive, which suggests that the optimal portfolio will involve investing in both. Human capital should be prioritized in many of Sub-Saharan Africa’s resource-rich countries because of the low starting point. Investing effectively in human capital is hard because it involves delivering services, which means coordinating a large number of actors and activities. Three dimensions of governance are key: institutions, incentives and information. Decentralization and leveraging the private sector are entry points to reforming institutional structures. Revenues from natural resources can fund financial incentives to strengthen performance or demand. Producing information, making it available, and increasing social accountability helps citizens understand their rights and hold governments and providers accountable. Improving the quality of education and health services is central to improving human capital. Two additional areas are promising. First, early child development—mother and newborn health, and early child nutrition, care, and education—improves outcomes in childhood and later on. Second, cash transfers—either conditional or unconditional—reduce poverty, increase household investments in child education, nutrition, and health, and increase the investment in productive assets which foster further income generation. 2017-05-02T16:34:57Z 2017-05-02T16:34:57Z 2017-05-02 Book 978-1-4648-1005-3 http://hdl.handle.net/10986/26490 English en_US Directions in Development—Human Development; CC BY 3.0 IGO http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/igo World Bank World Bank, Washington, DC Publications & Research Publications & Research :: Publication Africa Sub-Saharan Africa
repository_type	Digital Repository
institution_category	Foreign Institution
institution	Digital Repositories
building	World Bank Open Knowledge Repository
collection	World Bank
language	English en_US
topic	RESOURCE RENTS EDUCATION HUMAN CAPITAL INSTITUTIONS HUMAN DEVELOPMENT CASH TRANSFERS GOVERNANCE INFORMATION EXTRACTIVES EARLY CHILD DEVELOPMENT INCENTIVES
spellingShingle	RESOURCE RENTS EDUCATION HUMAN CAPITAL INSTITUTIONS HUMAN DEVELOPMENT CASH TRANSFERS GOVERNANCE INFORMATION EXTRACTIVES EARLY CHILD DEVELOPMENT INCENTIVES de la Brière, Bénédicte Filmer, Deon Ringold, Dena Rohner, Dominic Samuda, Karelle Denisova, Anastasiya From Mines and Wells to Well-Built Minds : Turning Sub-Saharan Africa's Natural Resource Wealth into Human Capital
geographic_facet	Africa Sub-Saharan Africa
relation	Directions in Development—Human Development;
description	Sub-Saharan Africa's natural resource-rich countries have poor human development. Children in these countries are more likely to die before their first birthday, more likely to be stunted, and less likely to attend school than children in other countries with similar income. Despite the current price downturn, extractives will remain an important part of Sub-Saharan Africa's growth story—using resource rents wisely remains a long term challenge. Governments must choose how to allocate resource rents between spending, investing in human or physical capital, or investing in global financial assets. The return to investing in physical and human capital will be high in countries where the capital stock is low. Moreover, higher levels of human capital make investments in physical capital more productive, which suggests that the optimal portfolio will involve investing in both. Human capital should be prioritized in many of Sub-Saharan Africa’s resource-rich countries because of the low starting point. Investing effectively in human capital is hard because it involves delivering services, which means coordinating a large number of actors and activities. Three dimensions of governance are key: institutions, incentives and information. Decentralization and leveraging the private sector are entry points to reforming institutional structures. Revenues from natural resources can fund financial incentives to strengthen performance or demand. Producing information, making it available, and increasing social accountability helps citizens understand their rights and hold governments and providers accountable. Improving the quality of education and health services is central to improving human capital. Two additional areas are promising. First, early child development—mother and newborn health, and early child nutrition, care, and education—improves outcomes in childhood and later on. Second, cash transfers—either conditional or unconditional—reduce poverty, increase household investments in child education, nutrition, and health, and increase the investment in productive assets which foster further income generation.
format	Book
author	de la Brière, Bénédicte Filmer, Deon Ringold, Dena Rohner, Dominic Samuda, Karelle Denisova, Anastasiya
author_facet	de la Brière, Bénédicte Filmer, Deon Ringold, Dena Rohner, Dominic Samuda, Karelle Denisova, Anastasiya
author_sort	de la Brière, Bénédicte
title	From Mines and Wells to Well-Built Minds : Turning Sub-Saharan Africa's Natural Resource Wealth into Human Capital
title_short	From Mines and Wells to Well-Built Minds : Turning Sub-Saharan Africa's Natural Resource Wealth into Human Capital
title_full	From Mines and Wells to Well-Built Minds : Turning Sub-Saharan Africa's Natural Resource Wealth into Human Capital
title_fullStr	From Mines and Wells to Well-Built Minds : Turning Sub-Saharan Africa's Natural Resource Wealth into Human Capital
title_full_unstemmed	From Mines and Wells to Well-Built Minds : Turning Sub-Saharan Africa's Natural Resource Wealth into Human Capital
title_sort	from mines and wells to well-built minds : turning sub-saharan africa's natural resource wealth into human capital
publisher	World Bank, Washington, DC
publishDate	2017
url	http://hdl.handle.net/10986/26490
_version_	1764462216199798784

From Mines and Wells to Well-Built Minds : Turning Sub-Saharan Africa's Natural Resource Wealth into Human Capital

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