ABSTRACT
The so-called ‘resource curse’, which appears to have inflicted such damage upon the growth prospects of each of the four main categories of the resource-abundant developing market economies during the final quarter of the twentieth century (Table 2.2) is not a deterministic law. If the governments of the CCA countries learn the lessons from that experience then natural resource rents can facilitate the transition to a market economy. Natural resource rent can confer three principal benefits. First, it can increase the rate of investment and thereby speed up the restructuring of the economy into competitive activity that will accelerate the sustainable rate of PCGDP growth. Second, it can expand the capacity of the CCA region to import those capital goods that the restructuring of their economies requires and that the region cannot supply. Third, the rent can cushion the social hardship associated with economic restructuring by increasing social assistance to those least able to fend for themselves.
