在一些非洲國家（包括加納、烏干達、坦桑尼亞和莫三比克），新自然資源的發現引發了一個重要問題：這些飛來橫財是富還是禍？會帶來繁榮和希望，還是與眾多先例一樣，成為政治和經濟的詛咒？
一般而言，資源富裕國經濟發展要比資源貧乏國表現更差。資源富裕國增長更慢，貧富不均的情況更嚴重，與你所設想的正好相反。畢竟，對自然資源課以高額徵稅不會讓它們消失，這意味着以自然資源為主要收入來源的國家可以用它們來為教育、醫療、發展和再分配融資。
資源充裕國的詛咒
經濟學和政治學有一個較大的分支致力於解釋這一「資源的詛咒」，公民社會團體（如歲入觀察和採掘業透明度計劃）的成立便是為了與此鬥爭。
眾所周知，資源的詛咒包括三大經濟成分：
‧資源富裕國的貨幣總是強勢的，因此阻礙了其他的出口。
‧由於資源開採通常不會創造很多就業，因此失業率會上升。
‧資源價格的波動導致增長極不穩定，國際銀行在商品價格高企時湧入，在商品價格低迷時湧出（這反映出一條亘古不變的原理，就是銀行家總是把錢借給根本不需要錢的人）惡化了這一狀況。
此外，資源富裕國通常不會追求可持續增長戰略。它們不會認識到，如果它們不將資源財富用於地上的生產性投資項目，事實上它們會愈變愈窮。政治上的無能加劇了這一問題，因為爭奪資源尋租的衝突滋生了腐敗和不民主的政府。
對 於這些問題，每一個都有眾所周知的解藥：低滙率、穩定基金、對資源收入（包括該國人民）的小心投資、禁止借貸，以及透明化（以便讓公民至少了解錢從何來，
向何處去）。但逐漸形成的共識是，這些措施雖然必要，卻並不充分。新致富國需要採取多個步驟才能增加「資源祝福」的可能性。
首先，這些國家 必須在確保公民獲得資源的完全價值方面做得更多。在自然資源公司（通常是外國企業）和本國人民之間往往存在不可避免的利益衝突。前者希望將支出最小化，而
後者希望將之最大化。巧妙設計的拍賣，提高競爭的透明度，才能帶來比黑箱作業更多的收入。開發項目合約也應該在陽光下進行，並且應該確保萬一資源價格上 漲，飛來橫財不會完全流入公司的腰包。
提高透明度及徵稅
不幸的是，許多國家已經簽署了不平等的開採合約，資源價值被外國公司攫走了。但有一個簡單的解決辦法：重新談判；如果重新談判不可行的話，可以徵收意外利潤稅。
放眼全球，各國已開始如此行動了。當然，自然資源公司也會有所準備，強調合約精神不可侵犯，還會以徹資來威脅。但結果通常正好相反，公平談判可以成為更好的長期合作關係的基礎。
非洲國家博茨瓦納對此類契約的重新談判，為其過去40年令人矚目的增長奠定了基礎。此外，不但玻利維亞和委內瑞拉等發展中國家財務了重新談判的做法，以色列和澳洲等發達國家也在這麼做。連美國也推出了意外利潤稅。
同樣重要的是，從自然資源中賺得的錢必須用於促進發展。就殖民勢力將非洲視為榨取資源的物件。一些新的資源買家也抱有相同態度。
基礎設施（公路、鐵路和港口）的建設帶有唯一的目的：讓資源以最低的價格運離該國，在開採國處理資源根本不予考慮，更不用說開發基於資源的本地工業了。
為長期發展奠基礎
真正的發展要求利用所有可以利用的關係：培訓本地工人、發展中小企業，以供應資源開採業和油氣公司的投入、就地處理資源，以及將自然資源嵌入該國經濟結構
中。當然，如今這些國家在這諸多方面並不具有比較優勢，有人會說國家應該堅持自己的優勢。從這個角度講，這些國家的比較優勢是讓其他國家開採它們的資源。 這是錯誤的。起作用的是動態比較優勢或長期比較優勢，這是可以培育的。
40年前，南韓的比較優勢是種植水稻。如果它堅持這一優勢，那麼永遠不會成為如今那樣的工業巨人。南韓也許是世界上最具效率的水稻生產國，但會一直窮下去。
公司會告訴加納、烏干達、坦桑尼亞和莫三比克快點行動，但它們有充分的理由謹慎行事。資源不會憑空消失，商品價格也在上漲。與此同時，這些國家可以實施所需的制度、政策和法律以確保資源的好處能被所有公民分享。
資源應該是福，而不是禍。它們可以是福，但不會自己變福，也不會輕易地變福。
作者為諾貝爾經濟學獎得主、哥倫比亞大學經濟學教授，近著有The Price of Inequality: How
Today's Divided Society Endangers our Future
KAMPALA – New
discoveries of natural resources in several African countries – including Ghana,
Uganda, Tanzania,
and Mozambique
– raise an important question: Will these windfalls be a blessing that brings
prosperity and hope, or a political and economic curse, as has been the case in
so many countries?
On average, resource-rich countries have done even more poorly than
countries without resources. They have grown more slowly, and with greater
inequality – just the opposite of what one would expect. After all, taxing
natural resources at high rates will not cause them to disappear, which means
that countries whose major source of revenue is natural resources can use them
to finance education, health care, development, and redistribution.
A large literature in economics and political science has developed to explain this “resource curse,”and civil-society groups (such as Revenue Watch and the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative) have been established to try to counter it. Three of the curse’s economic ingredients are well known:
There are well known antidotes to each of these problems: a low exchange rate, a stabilization fund, careful investment of resource revenues (including in the country’s people), a ban on borrowing, and transparency (so citizens can at least see the money coming in and going out). But there is a growing consensus that these measures, while necessary, are insufficient. Newly enriched countries need to take several more steps in order to increase the likelihood of a “resource blessing.”
First, these countries must do more to ensure that their citizens get the full value of the resources. There is an unavoidable conflict of interest between (usually foreign) natural-resource companies and host countries: the former want to minimize what they pay, while the latter need to maximize it. Well designed, competitive, transparent auctions can generate much more revenue than sweetheart deals. Contracts, too, should be transparent, and should ensure that if prices soar – as they have repeatedly – the windfall gain does not go only to the company.
Unfortunately, many countries have already signed bad contracts that give a disproportionate share of the resources’ value to private foreign companies. But there is a simple answer: renegotiate; if that is impossible, impose a windfall-profit tax.
All over the world, countries have been doing this. Of course, natural-resource companies will push back, emphasize the sanctity of contracts, and threaten to leave. But the outcome is typically otherwise. A fair renegotiation can be the basis of a better long-term relationship.
Botswana's renegotiations of such contracts laid the foundations of its remarkable growth for the last four decades. Moreover, it is not only developing countries, such as Bolivia and Venezuela, that renegotiate; developed countries like Israel and Australia have done so as well. Even the United States has imposed a windfall-profits tax.
Equally important, the money gained through natural resources must be used to promote development. The old colonial powers regarded Africa simply as a place from which to extract resources. Some of the new purchasers have a similar attitude.
Infrastructure (roads, railroads, and ports) has been built with one goal in mind: getting the resources out of the country at as low a price as possible, with no effort to process the resources in the country, let alone to develop local industries based on them.
Real development requires exploring all possible linkages: training local workers, developing small and medium-size enterprises to provide inputs for mining operations and oil and gas companies, domestic processing, and integrating the natural resources into the country’s economic structure. Of course, today, these countries may not have a comparative advantage in many of these activities, and some will argue that countries should stick to their strengths. From this perspective, these countries’ comparative advantage is having other countries exploit their resources.
That is wrong. What matters is dynamic comparative advantage, or comparative advantage in the long run, which can be shaped. Forty years ago, South Korea had a comparative advantage in growing rice. Had it stuck to that strength, it would not be the industrial giant that it is today. It might be the world’s most efficient rice grower, but it would still be poor.
Companies will tell Ghana, Uganda, Tanzania, and Mozambique to act quickly, but there is good reason for them to move more deliberately. The resources will not disappear, and commodity prices have been rising. In the meantime, these countries can put in place the institutions, policies, and laws needed to ensure that the resources benefit all of their citizens.
Resources should be a blessing, not a curse. They can be, but it will not happen on its own. And it will not happen easily.
Joseph E. Stiglitz: From Resource Curse to
Blessing
KAMPALA – New
discoveries of natural resources in several African countries – including Ghana,
Uganda, Tanzania,
and Mozambique
– raise an important question: Will these windfalls be a blessing that brings
prosperity and hope, or a political and economic curse, as has been the case in
so many countries?A large literature in economics and political science has developed to explain this “resource curse,”and civil-society groups (such as Revenue Watch and the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative) have been established to try to counter it. Three of the curse’s economic ingredients are well known:
- Resource-rich countries tend to have strong currencies, which impede other exports;
- Because resource extraction often entails little job creation, unemployment rises;
- Volatile resource prices cause growth to be unstable, aided by international banks that rush in when commodity prices are high and rush out in the downturns (reflecting the time-honored principle that bankers lend only to those who do not need their money).
There are well known antidotes to each of these problems: a low exchange rate, a stabilization fund, careful investment of resource revenues (including in the country’s people), a ban on borrowing, and transparency (so citizens can at least see the money coming in and going out). But there is a growing consensus that these measures, while necessary, are insufficient. Newly enriched countries need to take several more steps in order to increase the likelihood of a “resource blessing.”
First, these countries must do more to ensure that their citizens get the full value of the resources. There is an unavoidable conflict of interest between (usually foreign) natural-resource companies and host countries: the former want to minimize what they pay, while the latter need to maximize it. Well designed, competitive, transparent auctions can generate much more revenue than sweetheart deals. Contracts, too, should be transparent, and should ensure that if prices soar – as they have repeatedly – the windfall gain does not go only to the company.
Unfortunately, many countries have already signed bad contracts that give a disproportionate share of the resources’ value to private foreign companies. But there is a simple answer: renegotiate; if that is impossible, impose a windfall-profit tax.
All over the world, countries have been doing this. Of course, natural-resource companies will push back, emphasize the sanctity of contracts, and threaten to leave. But the outcome is typically otherwise. A fair renegotiation can be the basis of a better long-term relationship.
Botswana's renegotiations of such contracts laid the foundations of its remarkable growth for the last four decades. Moreover, it is not only developing countries, such as Bolivia and Venezuela, that renegotiate; developed countries like Israel and Australia have done so as well. Even the United States has imposed a windfall-profits tax.
Equally important, the money gained through natural resources must be used to promote development. The old colonial powers regarded Africa simply as a place from which to extract resources. Some of the new purchasers have a similar attitude.
Infrastructure (roads, railroads, and ports) has been built with one goal in mind: getting the resources out of the country at as low a price as possible, with no effort to process the resources in the country, let alone to develop local industries based on them.
Real development requires exploring all possible linkages: training local workers, developing small and medium-size enterprises to provide inputs for mining operations and oil and gas companies, domestic processing, and integrating the natural resources into the country’s economic structure. Of course, today, these countries may not have a comparative advantage in many of these activities, and some will argue that countries should stick to their strengths. From this perspective, these countries’ comparative advantage is having other countries exploit their resources.
That is wrong. What matters is dynamic comparative advantage, or comparative advantage in the long run, which can be shaped. Forty years ago, South Korea had a comparative advantage in growing rice. Had it stuck to that strength, it would not be the industrial giant that it is today. It might be the world’s most efficient rice grower, but it would still be poor.
Companies will tell Ghana, Uganda, Tanzania, and Mozambique to act quickly, but there is good reason for them to move more deliberately. The resources will not disappear, and commodity prices have been rising. In the meantime, these countries can put in place the institutions, policies, and laws needed to ensure that the resources benefit all of their citizens.
Resources should be a blessing, not a curse. They can be, but it will not happen on its own. And it will not happen easily.
Joseph E. Stiglitz, a Nobel laureate in economics, has pioneered path
breaking theories in the fields of economic information, taxation, development,
trade, and technical change. As a policymaker, he served on and later chaired
President Bill Clinton’s Council of Economic Advisers, and was Senior Vice
President and Chief Economist of the World Bank. He is currently a professor at
Columbia University, and has taught at Stanford, Yale, Princeton, and Oxford.He
is the author of The Price of
Inequality: How Today’s Divided Society Endangers our Future.