IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/idb/wpaper/3087.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Bolivia: Geography and Economic Development

Author

Listed:
  • Rolando Morales
  • Erwing Galopo
  • Luis Carlos Jemio
  • Carmen María Choque
  • Natacha Morales

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to identify the main relationship between economic development and geography at the province level in Bolivia. To achieve this, we study simultaneously the relationship between an index of basic needs insatisfaction (NBI), as a measure of human capital, and GDP per capita with geographical, demographical, institutional and structural economic variables. The estimation of GDP per capita for 112 provinces was carried out by estimating total wages based on employment surveys data and on GDP data available at the department level. The main findings of this study are: a) Geographical variables matter in the explanation of NBI, labor income and GDP per capita disparities among provinces, especially altitude, erosion, urbanization rate and the distance toward the main cities of the central axis of the country (La Paz, Cochabamba, Santa Cruz). The main channels for this are the effects of geographical variables on land and labor productivity. The location of mine resources also explains provincial disparities, and transportation costs matter concerning economic activity of the private sector. The effects of geography on labor productivity are widely influenced by people`s choice of province to live in, and this choice is strongly correlated with their education level. Bolivia is one of the poorest countries in Latin America; its development problems are complex and difficult to solve. As far as those developed in this research are concerned, we find that appropriate policies for promoting human development, migration and increasing land productivity can help to attain higher development levels and reduce provincial disparities.

Suggested Citation

  • Rolando Morales & Erwing Galopo & Luis Carlos Jemio & Carmen María Choque & Natacha Morales, 2000. "Bolivia: Geography and Economic Development," Research Department Publications 3087, Inter-American Development Bank, Research Department.
    • Handle: RePEc:idb:wpaper:3087
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.iadb.org/research/pub_hits.cfm?pub_id=R-387&pub_file_name=pubR-387.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Romer, Paul M, 1986. "Increasing Returns and Long-run Growth," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 94(5), pages 1002-1037, October.
    2. Ayres, W.S. & Anderson, K. & Hanrahan, D., 1998. "Setting Priorities for Environmental Management. An Application to the Mining Sector in Bolivia," Papers 398, World Bank - Technical Papers.
    3. David E. Bloom & Jeffrey D. Sachs, 1998. "Geography, Demography, and Economic Growth in Africa," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 29(2), pages 207-296.
    4. Ronald James Clark, 1968. "Land Reform and Peasant Market Participation on the North Highlands of Bolivia," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 44(2), pages 153-172.
    5. Romer, Paul M, 1990. "Endogenous Technological Change," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 98(5), pages 71-102, October.
    6. Robert E. Hall & Charles I. Jones, "undated". "The Productivity of Nations," Working Papers 96012, Stanford University, Department of Economics.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Morales, Rolando & Galoppo, Erwing & Jemio M., Luis Carlos & Choque, María Carmen & Morales, Natasha, 2000. "Bolivia: Geografía y desarrollo económico," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 2047, Inter-American Development Bank.
    2. Schreiner, Lena & Madlener, Reinhard, 2022. "Investing in power grid infrastructure as a flexibility option: A DSGE assessment for Germany," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 107(C).
    3. Luis Garicano & Thomas N. Hubbard, 2016. "The Returns to Knowledge Hierarchies," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 32(4), pages 653-684.
    4. B. Bhaskara Rao & Arusha Cooray, 2012. "How useful is growth literature for policies in the developing countries?," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 44(6), pages 671-681, February.
    5. Maurice Schiff & Yanling Wang, 2010. "North-South Technology Spillovers: The Relative Impact of Openness and Foreign R&D," International Economic Journal, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(2), pages 197-207.
    6. Tappeiner, Gottfried & Hauser, Christoph & Walde, Janette, 2008. "Regional knowledge spillovers: Fact or artifact?," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(5), pages 861-874, June.
    7. Dakpogan, Arnaud & Smit, Eon, 2018. "The effect of electricity losses on GDP in Benin," MPRA Paper 89545, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    8. Folster, Stefan & Henrekson, Magnus, 1999. "Growth and the public sector: a critique of the critics," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 15(2), pages 337-358, June.
    9. John Luke Gallup & Jeffrey D. Sachs & Andrew Mellinger, 1999. "Geography and Economic Development," CID Working Papers 1, Center for International Development at Harvard University.
    10. Christian Ragacs & Thomas Steinberger & Martin Zagler, 1998. "Growth Theories and the Persistence of Output Fluctuations: The Case of Austria," Department of Economics Working Papers wuwp060, Vienna University of Economics and Business, Department of Economics.
    11. Sina T. Ates & Felipe E. Saffie, 2013. "Project Heterogeneity and Growth: The Impact of Selection," PIER Working Paper Archive 13-011, Penn Institute for Economic Research, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania.
    12. Fr餩ric Laurin, 2012. "Trade and regional growth in Spain: panel cointegration in a small sample," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 44(4), pages 435-447, February.
    13. Cui, Dan & Wei, Xiang & Wu, Dianting & Cui, Nana & Nijkamp, Peter, 2019. "Leisure time and labor productivity: A new economic view rooted from sociological perspective," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 13, pages 1-24.
    14. Ryan, Michael P., 2010. "Patent Incentives, Technology Markets, and Public-Private Bio-Medical Innovation Networks in Brazil," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 38(8), pages 1082-1093, August.
    15. Andreas Schäfer & Thomas Steger, 2014. "Journey into the Unknown? Economic Consequences of Factor Market Integration under Increasing Returns to Scale," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 22(4), pages 783-807, September.
    16. Fedderke, J.W. & Bogetic, Z., 2009. "Infrastructure and Growth in South Africa: Direct and Indirect Productivity Impacts of 19 Infrastructure Measures," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 37(9), pages 1522-1539, September.
    17. Zeng, Jinli, 2003. "Reexamining the interaction between innovation and capital accumulation," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 25(4), pages 541-560, December.
    18. Cunado, J. & Perez de Gracia, F., 2006. "Real convergence in Africa in the second-half of the 20th century," Journal of Economics and Business, Elsevier, vol. 58(2), pages 153-167.
    19. Christopher B. Barrett, 2005. "Rural poverty dynamics: development policy implications," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 32(s1), pages 45-60, January.
    20. Mark Roberts, 2009. "International factor mobility and long-run economic growth," Discussion Papers 09/07, University of Nottingham, School of Economics.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:idb:wpaper:3087. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Felipe Herrera Library (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/iadbbus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.