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Ruggedness: The blessing of bad geography in Africa

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  • Nathan Nunn

    () (Harvard University and NBER)

  • Diego Puga

    () (IMDEA, Universidad Carlos III and CEPR)

Abstract

There is controversy about whether geography matters mainly because of its contemporaneous impact on economic outcomes or because of its interaction with historical events. Looking at terrain ruggedness, we are able to estimate the importance of these two channels. Because rugged terrain hinders trade and most productive activities, it has a negative direct effect on income. However, in Africa rugged terrain afforded protection to those being raided during the slave trades. Since the slave trades retarded subsequent economic development, in Africa ruggedness has also had a historical indirect positive effect on income. Studying all countries worldwide, we find that both effects are significant statistically and that for Africa the indirect positive effect is at least as large as the direct negative effect. Looking within Africa, we also provide evidence that the indirect effect operates through the slave trades.

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Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by Instituto Madrileño de Estudios Avanzados (IMDEA) Ciencias Sociales in its series Working Papers with number 2007-09.

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Date of creation: 01 Mar 2007
Date of revision: 01 May 2010
Publication status: Published in Review of Economics and Statistics 94(1), February 2012: 20-36
Handle: RePEc:imd:wpaper:wp2007-09

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Keywords: terrain ruggedness; slave trades; Africa; geography; economic development;

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