## Inclusive Growth: An Application of the Social Opportunity Function to Selected African Countries

_IMF Working Papers, June 3, 2013_

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## Bibliographic details
- Authors: Olumuyiwa S Adedeji, Huancheng Du, Maxwell Opoku-Afari
- Published: June 3, 2013
- Series: IMF Working Papers
- DOI: https://doi.org/10.5089/9781484360880.001

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### Summary findings
- The inclusiveness of growth depends on the extent of access to economic and social opportunities.
- The paper applies the concept of social opportunity function to ascertain the inclusiveness of growth episodes in selected African countries.
- Premised on the concept of social welfare function, inclusive growth is associated with increased average opportunities available to the population and improvement in their distribution.
- The paper establishes that the high growth episodes in the last decade in the selected countries came with increased average opportunities in education and health.
- The distribution of such opportunities varied across countries, depending on the country-specific policies underpinning the growth episodes.

### Methodology and concepts
- Analytical framework: social opportunity function, grounded in the concept of social welfare function.
- Outcome dimensions analyzed: education and health (including completion rate, education enrollment, enrollment rate, primary school education, secondary education, mortality rate, health care).
- Equity focus: assessment of both average opportunities and their distribution (social opportunity curve).

### Policy implications and interpretation
- Improvements in average education and health opportunities accompanied high growth episodes in the studied countries.
- Heterogeneity in distributional outcomes across countries implies a central role for country-specific policies underpinning growth episodes.
- Policy emphasis: design and implementation of country-specific policies that simultaneously raise average opportunities and improve their distribution to achieve inclusive growth.

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_Source: https://www.imf.org/en/publications/wp/issues/2016/12/31/inclusive-growth-an-application-of-the-social-opportunity-function-to-selected-african-40628_