Infrastructure and Growth in Developing Asia

Abstract

This paper applies two distinct approaches—growth regressions and growth accounting—to analyze the link between infrastructure, growth, and productivity in developing Asian countries. The main conclusion is that a number of countries in developing Asia have significantly improved their basic infrastructure endowments in the recent past. This improvement appears to correlate significantly with good growth performances. However, the evidence seems to indicate that this is mostly the result of factor accumulation, a direct effect, and that the impact on productivity is rather inconclusive.