This Topic Guide provides advisers with an overview of how the poor can benefit from economic infrastructure projects. The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD 2006) defines economic infrastructure as infrastructure for transport, energy, information and communication technology, as well as for drinking water, sanitation and irrigation. For the purposes of this study, the authors examined all these sectors except water and sanitation, and focused on large-scale capital projects. Large projects principally aim to stimulate economic growth and industrial development. Direct impact on poverty reduction is likely to be a secondary concern. This Topic Guide also examines the potential of infrastructure associated with the extractives sector to serve broader development goals.The weight of literature suggests that improving economic infrastructure can speed upeconomic growth. No country has sustained rapid growth without public investment in infrastructure (Commission on Growth and Development 2008). There is strong evidence that growth is key to long-term poverty reduction (ibid.). However, to significantly reduce poverty, growth must be accompanied by wide economic transformation that benefits the poor and shares prosperity broadly.

Topic Guide: Maximising the Benefits to the Poor from Infrastructure Programmes aimed at Increasing Growth

Resource Key: GYFQZIWJ

Document Type: Report

Creator:

Author:

  • John Hawkins
  • Jill Wells
  • Bernadine Fernz

Creators Name: {mb_resource_zotero_creatorsname}

Place:

Institution: Department for International Development (DFID)

Date: 2014

Language:

This Topic Guide provides advisers with an overview of how the poor can benefit from economic infrastructure projects. The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD 2006) defines economic infrastructure as infrastructure for transport, energy, information and communication technology, as well as for drinking water, sanitation and irrigation. For the purposes of this study, the authors examined all these sectors except water and sanitation, and focused on large-scale capital projects. Large projects principally aim to stimulate economic growth and industrial development. Direct impact on poverty reduction is likely to be a secondary concern. This Topic Guide also examines the potential of infrastructure associated with the extractives sector to serve broader development goals.The weight of literature suggests that improving economic infrastructure can speed upeconomic growth. No country has sustained rapid growth without public investment in infrastructure (Commission on Growth and Development 2008). There is strong evidence that growth is key to long-term poverty reduction (ibid.). However, to significantly reduce poverty, growth must be accompanied by wide economic transformation that benefits the poor and shares prosperity broadly.

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