Taking Ethiopia as a case study, this work examines the prevailing views on the poverty of much of Africa and argues that the current situation can be reversed by attacking the root causes of poverty - once they are properly understood.

It provided technical and financial support to economic research centres in sub-Sahara Africa (SSA) so that they can undertake policy-relevant research with the goal of influencing economic policy-making. In January 2005, the Secretariat organized an international conference in Dakar, Senegal, during which participants from key economic think tanks presented their experiences in the policy development process in Africa. Of particular interest was the role of economic research and economic researchers in policy-making. The authors examine the extent to which economic policies that are formulated in the sub-continent draw from research based on local realities and undertaken by local researchers and research networks in Africa.

Why is Africa so poor? Contrary to prevailing arguments, The African Paradox; Is China the Solution argues that Africa's poverty has little or nothing to do with corruption, colonialism, slavery, tribalism, war and disease, etc. Rather, Africa has remained poor because it has not learned how to create value-how to make the products or offer the services that people need. Why has it not been able to learn how to create value? The book offers five reasons. First, driven by a false sense of entitlement, many Africans have focused on value capture rather than value creation-focused on finding ways to consumer what others have made rather than learning how to do things for themselves. Second, it has not been in the interest of rich countries and their businesses to help African countries build value creation capabilities. It does not make sense for rich countries to make smart rivals out of loyal customers and suppliers. Third, the timing has not been right, yet. Fourth, African countries have failed to identify their strengths and opportunities and capitalize on them. Fifth, Africa and its benefactors have failed to understand that the transformation of Africa from poor to rich is a radical innovation, and therefore failed to pursue the right strategies. The book offers five strategies that African countries can use to dig themselves out of poverty. It also argues that China can be a huge part of the solution to Africa's poverty problem.

Clayton M. Christensen, the author of such business classics as The Innovator’s Dilemma and the New York Times bestseller How Will You Measure Your Life, and co-authors Efosa Ojomo and Karen Dillon reveal why so many investments in economic development fail to generate sustainable prosperity, and offers a groundbreaking solution for true and lasting change. Global poverty is one of the world’s most vexing problems. For decades, we’ve assumed smart, well-intentioned people will eventually be able to change the economic trajectory of poor countries. From education to healthcare, infrastructure to eradicating corruption, too many solutions rely on trial and error. Essentially, the plan is often to identify areas that need help, flood them with resources, and hope to see change over time. But hope is not an effective strategy. Clayton M. Christensen and his co-authors reveal a paradox at the heart of our approach to solving poverty. While noble, our current solutions are not producing consistent results, and in some cases, have exacerbated the problem. At least twenty countries that have received billions of dollars’ worth of aid are poorer now. Applying the rigorous and theory-driven analysis he is known for, Christensen suggests a better way. The right kind of innovation not only builds companies—but also builds countries. The Prosperity Paradox identifies the limits of common economic development models, which tend to be top-down efforts, and offers a new framework for economic growth based on entrepreneurship and market-creating innovation. Christensen, Ojomo, and Dillon use successful examples from America’s own economic development, including Ford, Eastman Kodak, and Singer Sewing Machines, and shows how similar models have worked in other regions such as Japan, South Korea, Nigeria, Rwanda, India, Argentina, and Mexico. The ideas in this book will help companies desperate for real, long-term growth see actual, sustainable progress where they’ve failed before. But The Prosperity Paradox is more than a business book; it is a call to action for anyone who wants a fresh take for making the world a better and more prosperous place.

African religious experience a conflict between what they promise in terms of poverty and the fact that they live in relative material affluence. Poverty in Africa is always seen as evil; it prevents abundant life. Africans do not enter a nurturing international community because they want to live a life of deprivation, but because they feel attracted to a relational religious way of life. It is only during their formation that most of them discover that there is a vow of "poverty." This concept is a rudiment of Western spirituality that emphasized asceticism and mortification. However, African religious interpret this vow as participation with a nurturing intentional community. When African religious talk about their "poverty" they usually mean a relational reality: the separation from close relatives and the incapacity to assist them materially, the unmarried and childless state, the coercive dimension of community life. This thesis argues that the paradox of vowed poverty to African religious can not be solved by voluntary deprivation, but by (1) a "fundamental option for the poor" and by (2) giving the vow a more relational name like "sharing," "commitment," or "solidarity"--for example, "solidarity with the poor." In terms of relational poverty, this research shows that African religious would like their congregations to develop a more practical and humane policy toward close relatives in need.

Debunking the current model of international aid promoted by both Hollywood celebrities and policy makers, Moyo offers a bold new road map for financing development of the world's poorest countries.

Perceptions of Africa have changed dramatically. Viewed as a continent of wars, famines and entrenched poverty in the late 1990s, there is now a focus on “Africa rising†? and an “African 21st century.†? Two decades of unprecedented economic growth in Africa should have brought substantial improvements in well-being. Whether or not they did, remains unclear given the poor quality of the data, the nature of the growth process (especially the role of natural resources), conflicts that affect part of the region, and high population growth. Poverty in a Rising Africa documents the data challenges and systematically reviews the evidence on poverty from monetary and nonmonetary perspectives, as well as a focus on dimensions of inequality. Chapter 1 maps out the availability and quality of the data needed to track monetary poverty, reflects on the governance and political processes that underpin the current situation with respect to data production, and describes some approaches to addressing the data gaps. Chapter 2 evaluates the robustness of the estimates of poverty in Africa. It concludes that poverty reduction in Africa may be slightly greater than traditional estimates suggest, although even the most optimistic estimates of poverty reduction imply that more people lived in poverty in 2012 than in 1990. A broad-stroke profile of poverty and trends in poverty in the region is presented. Chapter 3 broadens the view of poverty by considering nonmonetary dimensions of well-being, such as education, health, and freedom, using Sen's (1985) capabilities and functioning approach. While progress has been made in a number of these areas, levels remain stubbornly low. Chapter 4 reviews the evidence on inequality in Africa. It looks not only at patterns of monetary inequality in Africa but also other dimensions, including inequality of opportunity, intergenerational mobility in occupation and education, and extreme wealth in Africa.