The study of economic development has attracted the attention of economists right from Adam Smith down to Karl Marx and Keynes. However, they were mainly interested in the problems which were essentially static in nature and largely related to a Western European framework of social and cultural institutions. It was after the Second World War…
Category: Economics – Studies
Basic economic studies for schools
The Meaning of Economic Development
The Orthodox Perception or the Mainstream School of Thought; (Diffusion Model)The orthodox perceptions of the concept of economic development can be summarised as follows: (i) To develop, the country must institute capitalism, as the market mechanism (market forces) constitute the best resource allocative device. This implies that government’s intervention in the economy is rejected.(ii) Economic…
Distinction between Economic Growth and Economic Development
(i) Meaning of Economic Growth Economic growth is usually defined as the rate of expansion of the national income or total volume of production of goods and services, of a country. It is seen as the capacity to generate and sustain increase in the GNP. According to this view, a country is said to have…
General Strategies for Achieving Economic Growth and Economic Development
(i) Increasing the size of the national output (GNO); by improving the quantity and quality of the country’s factors of production, so that output would increase. (ii) Increasing the infrastructural facilities such as roads, schools, hospitals, electricity, water, etc. (iii) Redistributing the national output equitably. (iv) Political stability. (v) Economic stability. (vi) improvements in terms…
Underdevelopment
Underdevelopment is the sum of all the processes and forces at work, keeping a country’s society, polity and economy within a dependant framework i.e. depending on other countries for survival. Characteristics of UnderdevelopmentA country is said to be experiencing underdevelopment when it exhibits the following characteristics. (i) Low per capital income -Where the income per…
Obstacles to Economic Development
a. Vicious circles of poverty: There are circular relationships known as the vicious circles of poverty that tend to perpetuate the low level of development in LDCS. Professor Nuakse explains the idea in these words: It implies a circular constellation of forces tending to act and react upon one another in such a way as…
Main Reasons for Lack of Incentives to Save/Invest in LDCS
(i) Imperfect maintenance of law and order. (ii) Political instability. (iii) Unsettled monetary conditions. (iv) Lack of continuity in economic life. (v) The extended family system with its drain on resources. (vi) Socio-cultural Constraints:Economic development has much to do with human endowments, social attitudes and historical accidents. In LDCS, institutional factors characterised by rigid stratification…
Environmental Economics
The problems of environmental degradation are by no means new in Nigeria. What is new and different is the amount of attention the community is now prepared to give to environmental problems. Perhaps much of this increase can be attributed to rising income levels which have freed people from the more urgent concerns about food,…
Conceptual Issues
Environmental Economics The term environment has been defined as the conditions, circumstances and influences, under which an organism or system exists. It may be affected by physical, chemical or biological factors – both natural and man-made. It is used to refer to the circumstances in which man lives. In Economics, the environment is viewed as…
The Supply-Demand Analysis of Environmental Problems
The basic supply-demand model can help to explain the externalities analysis of environmental problems and its implication for public policy. As an illustration, we should be dealing with the problem of solid wastes and the damage that the massive generation of garbage is doing to our environment. In the figure below, we have a demand…
General Factors Causing Problems to the Environment in Nigeria
Factors causing problems to the environment include the following: (i) Rural-urban migration – which leads to overcrowding in the urban areas, and excess demand for basic social and economic infrastructure and energy. The overcrowding brings about health problems such as tuberculosis, meningitis and influenza. It also leads to frequent accidents and increase in crime rates.…
Methods for Controlling Environmental Degradation
Banmol and Blinder (1979) have outlined and discussed three methods for the control of activities that damage the environment as follows: (i) Voluntary Programmes: This takes the form of non-mandatory investment in pollution control equipment by firms that decide to act in a manner that meets their social responsibilities or voluntary separation of such wastes…
Development of the Petroleum Industry in Nigeria
Nigeria’s oil industry began in 1908 when a German company, The Nigerian Bitumen Corporation (NBC), was granted license to exploit hydrocarbon deposits, around Araromi east of present day Lagos State. This area has since been recognised as part of the tar sand belt of the Dahomey Basin. The Germans were unlucky, as their pioneering work…
The Contributions of Petroleum to the Nigerian Economy
Positive Contribution a. Foreign Exchange Earnings:Crude oil has been the greatest foreign exchange earner for the country. In 1970, oil contributed 58.1 percent of Nigeria’s foreign exchange earnings, 87. 2 per cent in 1972 and 95. 1 per cent in 1984. In 1983 alone, Nigeria realised 43.6, billion Naira from oil alone. Between 1996 and…
The Role of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) in the Development of the Oil Industry in Nigeria
The emergence of petroleum in the Nigerian economic scene inevitably resulted in government setting up monitoring and control regulations for the industry. In 1970, the Petroleum division of the Federal Ministry of Mines and Power which had been created in 1962, was upgraded to become the Department of Petroleum Resources in the Ministry of Mines…
The Role of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC)
Its DevelopmentAs the value of oil became glaring, the oil producers realised that they need to form a body, and in 1960, the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) was born with its headquarters in Geneva (Switzerland). OPEC is made up of all the oil producing Third World countries namely, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Libya, Algeria,…
Problems Facing OPEC
In an attempt to realise its objectives, OPEC is encountering a number of problems: (i) Chiselling (or secret price cutting) by its members:Following the success of OPEC for over a decade, the importing countries started manipulating to weaken the strength of the cartel to bring about further price fall. They started dealing with individual governments.…
What is Economic Planning?
Economic planning is a conscious governmental effort to influence, direct and control changes in the principal economic variables of a country, over time in order to achieve a specific set of objectives. It is a rational and systematic allocation of resources by the government, aimed at increasing the rate of economic development. The essence of…
Types of Economic Planning
Economic planning can be classified into two categories: Aggregate Economic Planning This is a type of development planning which deals with the entire economy. The whole economic system is seen as a unit. The major macro-economic variables like consumption, production, investment, saving, exports and imports which are critical for the performance of the economy, are…
Problems of Economic Planning
The problems associated with economic planning include: Political Instability Political instability often leads to change in plans. Sometimes, if the development plans are continued, there are shifts in targets and area of emphasis. The new government in turn will come up with plan review and implementation only to be ousted by another government e.g. in…
