IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wly/jintdv/v35y2023i6p1121-1142.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Recessions and recoveries in Central African countries: Lessons from the past

Author

Listed:
  • Any Flore Djoumessi Djoukouo

Abstract

The Great Financial Crisis and the COVID‐19 pandemic have raised concerns about business cycles. In this paper, we examine the dynamics of past business cycles in CAEMC economies to infer the shapes of recessions and subsequent recoveries. We use annual GDP data covering the period 1960–2020 and non‐parametric approach. The main results are fourfold. First, recessions are, on average, long with a positive duration dependence relationship and the strength of recoveries is independent of the duration and the depth of the associated recessions. Second, recessions and recoveries are not all alike, meaning that history cannot be used as a guide for forecasting issue. Third, nearly 45% of the recessions and subsequent recoveries are V‐shaped, and the L, U and W patterns appear when governments are heavily indebted. Fourth, a regional cycle sometimes emerges. The results suggest a strengthening of the capacities of CAEMC states and a resilient supply chain management.

Suggested Citation

  • Any Flore Djoumessi Djoukouo, 2023. "Recessions and recoveries in Central African countries: Lessons from the past," Journal of International Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 35(6), pages 1121-1142, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:wly:jintdv:v:35:y:2023:i:6:p:1121-1142
    DOI: 10.1002/jid.3721
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1002/jid.3721
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1002/jid.3721?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Frankel, Jeffrey A & Rose, Andrew K, 1998. "The Endogeneity of the Optimum Currency Area Criteria," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 108(449), pages 1009-1025, July.
    2. Mike Artis & Hans-Martin Krolzig & Juan Toro, 2004. "The European business cycle," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 56(1), pages 1-44, January.
    3. Kim, Chang-Jin & Nelson, Charles R, 1999. "Friedman's Plucking Model of Business Fluctuations: Tests and Estimates of Permanent and Transitory Components," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 31(3), pages 317-334, August.
    4. Beaudry, Paul & Koop, Gary, 1993. "Do recessions permanently change output?," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(2), pages 149-163, April.
    5. Zarnowitz, Victor & Ozyildirim, Ataman, 2006. "Time series decomposition and measurement of business cycles, trends and growth cycles," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(7), pages 1717-1739, October.
    6. Valerie Cerra & Sweta Chaman Saxena, 2008. "Growth Dynamics: The Myth of Economic Recovery," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(1), pages 439-457, March.
    7. Martínez-García, Enrique & Grossman, Valerie & Mack, Adrienne, 2015. "A contribution to the chronology of turning points in global economic activity (1980–2012)," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 170-185.
    8. Chang‐Jin Kim & James Morley & Jeremy Piger, 2005. "Nonlinearity and the permanent effects of recessions," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 20(2), pages 291-309.
    9. Calderón, César & Fuentes, J. Rodrigo, 2014. "Have business cycles changed over the last two decades? An empirical investigation," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 109(C), pages 98-123.
    10. Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff, 2014. "Recovery from Financial Crises: Evidence from 100 Episodes," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(5), pages 50-55, May.
    11. Ilse Mintz, 1969. "Dating Postwar Business Cycles: Methods and Their Application to Western Germany, 1950–67," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number mint69-1, June.
    12. Fabrizio Carmignani, 2010. "Endogenous Optimal Currency Areas: the Case of the Central African Economic and Monetary Community," Journal of African Economies, Centre for the Study of African Economies, vol. 19(1), pages 25-51, January.
    13. Borsi, Mihály Tamás, 2018. "Credit contractions and unemployment," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 573-593.
    14. Pablo A. Guerron‐Quintana & Ryo Jinnai, 2019. "Financial frictions, trends, and the great recession," Quantitative Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 10(2), pages 735-773, May.
    15. Gadea, María Dolores & Gomez-Loscos, Ana & Perez-Quiros, Gabriel, 2017. "Dissecting US recoveries," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 154(C), pages 59-63.
    16. Hamilton, James D, 1989. "A New Approach to the Economic Analysis of Nonstationary Time Series and the Business Cycle," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 57(2), pages 357-384, March.
    17. Valerie Cerra & Ugo Panizza & Sweta C. Saxena, 2013. "International Evidence On Recovery From Recessions," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 31(2), pages 424-439, April.
    18. Gilles Q Kane & Marius C. O. Amba & Taoufiki Mbratana, 2020. "Early view of the potential impact of government policy responses on reproductive number of COVID-19 in African countries: Evidence from Cameroon," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 40(3), pages 2419-2430.
    19. Don Harding & Adrian Pagan, 2016. "The Econometric Analysis of Recurrent Events in Macroeconomics and Finance," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 10744.
    20. Sichel, Daniel E, 1994. "Inventories and the Three Phases of the Business Cycle," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 12(3), pages 269-277, July.
    21. Claudio Borio, 2014. "The financial cycle and macroeconomics: what have we learned and what are the policy implications?," Chapters, in: Ewald Nowotny & Doris Ritzberger-Grünwald & Peter Backé (ed.), Financial Cycles and the Real Economy, chapter 2, pages 10-35, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    22. Dhruv Sharma & Jean-Philippe Bouchaud & Stanislao Gualdi & Marco Tarzia & Francesco Zamponi, 2021. "V–, U–, L– or W–shaped economic recovery after Covid-19: Insights from an Agent Based Model," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 16(3), pages 1-22, March.
    23. Dhruv Sharma & Jean-Philippe Bouchaud & Stanislao Gualdi & Marco Tarzia & Francesco Zamponi, 2020. "V-, U-, L-, or W-shaped economic recovery after COVID: Insights from an Agent Based Model," Papers 2006.08469, arXiv.org, revised Feb 2021.
    24. Yunjong Eo & James Morley, 2022. "Why Has the U.S. Economy Stagnated since the Great Recession?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 104(2), pages 246-258, May.
    25. Borio, Claudio, 2014. "The financial cycle and macroeconomics: What have we learnt?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 182-198.
    26. Chauvet, Marcelle & Piger, Jeremy, 2008. "A Comparison of the Real-Time Performance of Business Cycle Dating Methods," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 26, pages 42-49, January.
    27. Eisenbach, Thomas M. & Kovner, Anna & Lee, Michael Junho, 2022. "Cyber risk and the U.S. financial system: A pre-mortem analysis," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 145(3), pages 802-826.
    28. Yunjong Eo & Chang-Jin Kim, 2016. "Markov-Switching Models with Evolving Regime-Specific Parameters: Are Postwar Booms or Recessions All Alike?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 98(5), pages 940-949, December.
    29. Victor Zarnowitz, 1991. "What is a Business Cycle?," NBER Working Papers 3863, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    30. Lawrence H. Summers, 2015. "Demand Side Secular Stagnation," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(5), pages 60-65, May.
    31. Stiglitz, Joseph E., 2021. "The proper role of government in the market economy: The case of the post-COVID recovery," Journal of Government and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 1(C).
    32. Agnieszka Gehringer & Thomas Mayer, 2021. "Measuring the Business Cycle Chronology with a Novel Business Cycle Indicator for Germany," Journal of Business Cycle Research, Springer;Centre for International Research on Economic Tendency Surveys (CIRET), vol. 17(1), pages 71-89, April.
    33. Eichengreen, Barry & Park, Donghyun & Shin, Kwanho, 2021. "The shape of recovery: Implications of past experience for the duration of the COVID-19 recession," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 69(C).
    34. Gerhard Bry & Charlotte Boschan, 1971. "Foreword to "Cyclical Analysis of Time Series: Selected Procedures and Computer Programs"," NBER Chapters, in: Cyclical Analysis of Time Series: Selected Procedures and Computer Programs, pages -1, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    35. Reynald Majetti, 2012. "Caractérisation et datation des cycles économiques : le cas français," Revue d'économie politique, Dalloz, vol. 122(3), pages 365-403.
    36. Robert E. Lucas Jr., 2003. "Macroeconomic Priorities," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(1), pages 1-14, March.
    37. Bruce C. Greenwald & Joseph E. Stiglitz, 1993. "Financial Market Imperfections and Business Cycles," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 108(1), pages 77-114.
    38. Lawrence H Summers, 2014. "U.S. Economic Prospects: Secular Stagnation, Hysteresis, and the Zero Lower Bound," Business Economics, Palgrave Macmillan;National Association for Business Economics, vol. 49(2), pages 65-73, April.
    39. Martha L. Olney & Aaron Pacitti, 2017. "The Rise Of Services, Deindustrialization, And The Length Of Economic Recovery," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 55(4), pages 1625-1647, October.
    40. Gerhard Bry & Charlotte Boschan, 1971. "Cyclical Analysis of Time Series: Selected Procedures and Computer Programs," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number bry_71-1, June.
    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. Olivier Darné & Laurent Ferrara, 2011. "Identification of Slowdowns and Accelerations for the Euro Area Economy," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 73(3), pages 335-364, June.
    2. Camarero, Mariam & Gadea-Rivas, María Dolores & Gómez-Loscos, Ana & Tamarit, Cecilio, 2021. "Effects of external imbalances on GDP recovery patterns," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 182(C), pages 349-362.
    3. Antonin Aviat & Frédérique Bec & Claude Diebolt & Catherine Doz & Denis Ferrand & Laurent Ferrara & Eric Heyer & Valérie Mignon & Pierre-Alain Pionnier, 2021. "Dating business cycles in France: a reference chronology," SciencePo Working papers Main hal-03373425, HAL.
    4. Bec, F. & Bouabdallah, O. & Ferrara, L., 2011. "The possible shapes of recoveries in Markov-switching models," Working papers 321, Banque de France.
    5. Mariam Camarero & María Dolores Gadea-Rivas & Ana Gómez-Loscos & Cecilio Tamarit, 2019. "External imbalances and recoveries," Working Papers 1912, Department of Applied Economics II, Universidad de Valencia.
    6. Duprey, Thibaut & Klaus, Benjamin & Peltonen, Tuomas, 2017. "Dating systemic financial stress episodes in the EU countries," Journal of Financial Stability, Elsevier, vol. 32(C), pages 30-56.
    7. M. Ayhan Kose & Naotaka Sugawara & Marco E. Terrones, 2020. "Global Recessions," Working Papers 162, Peruvian Economic Association.
    8. Dovern, Jonas & Jannsen, Nils, 2017. "Systematic errors in growth expectations over the business cycle," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 33(4), pages 760-769.
    9. Bec, Frédérique & Bouabdallah, Othman & Ferrara, Laurent, 2015. "Comparing the shape of recoveries: France, the UK and the US," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 327-334.
    10. Charles, Amélie & Darné, Olivier & Diebolt, Claude & Ferrara, Laurent, 2015. "A new monthly chronology of the US industrial cycles in the prewar economy," Journal of Financial Stability, Elsevier, vol. 17(C), pages 3-9.
    11. Eduardo Bandrés & María Dolores Gadea-Rivas & Ana Gómez-Loscos, 2017. "Regional business cycles across europe," Occasional Papers 1702, Banco de España.
    12. James Morley & Jeremy Piger, 2006. "The Importance of Nonlinearity in Reproducing Business Cycle Features," Contributions to Economic Analysis, in: Nonlinear Time Series Analysis of Business Cycles, pages 75-95, Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
    13. Kamel Helali, 2022. "Markov Switching-Vector AutoRegression Model Analysis of the Economic and Growth Cycles in Tunisia and Its Main European Partners," Journal of the Knowledge Economy, Springer;Portland International Center for Management of Engineering and Technology (PICMET), vol. 13(1), pages 656-686, March.
    14. Chang‐Jin Kim & James Morley & Jeremy Piger, 2005. "Nonlinearity and the permanent effects of recessions," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 20(2), pages 291-309.
    15. Òscar Jordà & Moritz Schularick & Alan M. Taylor, 2020. "Disasters Everywhere: The Costs of Business Cycles Reconsidered," Staff Reports 925, Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
    16. Harry X. Wu & Eric Girardin, 2016. "The ‘new’ normal is ‘old’ in China: Very late catching up and return to the (pre-WTO) old normal," EcoMod2016 9721, EcoMod.
    17. Sergey V. Smirnov & Nikolay V. Kondrashov & Anna V. Petronevich, 2017. "Dating Cyclical Turning Points for Russia: Formal Methods and Informal Choices," Journal of Business Cycle Research, Springer;Centre for International Research on Economic Tendency Surveys (CIRET), vol. 13(1), pages 53-73, May.
    18. Calderón, César & Fuentes, J. Rodrigo, 2014. "Have business cycles changed over the last two decades? An empirical investigation," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 109(C), pages 98-123.
    19. Sui Luo & Yu‐Fan Huang & Richard Startz, 2021. "Are Recoveries all the Same: GDP and TFP?," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 83(5), pages 1111-1129, October.
    20. Jonas Dovern & Christopher Zuber, 2020. "Recessions and Potential Output: Disentangling Measurement Errors, Supply Shocks, and Hysteresis Effects," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 122(4), pages 1431-1466, October.

    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:wly:jintdv:v:35:y:2023:i:6:p:1121-1142. 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: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/5102/home .

    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.