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The impact of Chinese FDI in Africa: evidence from Ethiopia

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  • Crescenzi, Riccardo
  • Limodio, Nicola

Abstract

We exploit exogenous variation in China’s export taxes to investigate the impact of Chinese foreign direct investment (FDI) in Ethiopia. Higher sector-specific export taxes in China lead to more Chinese FDI in Ethiopian districts specialized in those sectors and generate highly heterogeneous effects. Domestic firms competing with Chinese FDI reduce their sales, investment, inputs and prices, while firms in upstream and downstream sectors expand. We build a 20-year district panel of night lights and observe that Chinese FDI leads to no instantaneous impact on local growth, but significant and persistently positive effects after 6-12 years.

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  • Crescenzi, Riccardo & Limodio, Nicola, 2021. "The impact of Chinese FDI in Africa: evidence from Ethiopia," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 108455, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    • Handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:108455
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    Cited by:

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    2. Julia Fonseca & Adrien Matray, 2022. "Financial Inclusion, Economic Development, and Inequality: Evidence from Brazil," Working Papers 308, Princeton University, Department of Economics, Center for Economic Policy Studies..
    3. Drinkwater, Stephen & Robinson, Catherine, 2023. "The impact of customs and trade regulations on the operations of African firms," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 165(C).
    4. Mensah,Justice Tei & Traore,Nouhoum-000531164, 2022. "Infrastructure Quality and FDI Inflows : Evidence from the Arrival of High-Speed Internet in Africa," Policy Research Working Paper Series 9946, The World Bank.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    foreign direct investment; domestic investment; growth;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F23 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - Multinational Firms; International Business
    • O16 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Financial Markets; Saving and Capital Investment; Corporate Finance and Governance
    • O47 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity - - - Empirical Studies of Economic Growth; Aggregate Productivity; Cross-Country Output Convergence

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