TY  - JOUR
AU  - Sala-i-Martin,Xavier
AU  - Subramanian,Arvind
TI  - Addressing the Natural Resource Curse: An Illustration from Nigeria
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 9804
PY  - 2003
Y2  - June 2003
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w9804
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w9804.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Xavier Sala-i-Martin
Department of Economics
Columbia University
420 West 118th Street, 1005
New York, NY 10027
Tel: 212/854-7055
Fax: 212/854-8059
E-Mail: xs23@columbia.edu

Arvind Subramanian
Peterson Institute for International Economics
1750 Massachusetts Ave, NW
Washington, DC  20036
E-Mail: asubramanian@piie.com
AB  - Some natural resources -- oil and minerals in particular -- exert a negative and nonlinear impact on growth via their deleterious impact on institutional quality. We show this result to be very robust. The Nigerian experience provides telling confirmation of this aspect of natural resources. Waste and corruption from oil rather than Dutch disease has been responsible for its poor long run economic performance. We propose a solution for addressing this resource curse which involves directly distributing the oil revenues to the public. Even with all the difficulties of corruption and inefficiency that will no doubt plague its actual implementation, our proposal will, at the least, be vastly superior to the status quo. At best, however, it could fundamentally improve the quality of public institutions and, as a result, transform economics and politics in Nigeria.
ER  -