On the Good and Bad of Natural Resource, Corruption, and Economic Growth Nexus

The empirical finding that countries endowed with vast reserves of natural resources are expected to experience slower economic growth – the resource curse hypothesis – has sparked debate in the literature about whether natural resources are a curse or a boon. In this study, we re-investigate the natural resource, corruption and growth nexus by using a relatively longer dataset for a panel of countries. Unlike previous attempts, we take into account the potential endogeneity and asymmetric effect in our analysis by applying a recently developed panel quantile estimator. We also focus on the role of corruption in influencing the impact of natural resources on economic growth. Broadly the findings are indicative of an asymmetric effect of resources as the sign and magnitude of natural resources’ impact on economic growth varies over different income quantiles. Although the overall results are mixed, but the results based on fuel export and oil–gas rents as measures of resource endowment are consistent with the ‘resource curse’ hypothesis. Nonetheless, the findings suggest that corruption is critical in determining the marginal impact of natural resources on growth and in many cases, it has effectively transformed the negative effects of natural resources to positive effects in low-to-middle-income countries.