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Volume 1, Issue 1-2, December 2014, Pages 45 - 52
On the accuracy of trade and GDP statistics in Africa: Errors of commission and omission
Authors
Morten Jerven
School for International Studies, Simon Fraser University, 7200-515 West Hastings Street, Vancouver, BC V6B 5K3, Canada
Received 8 February 2014, Revised 10 August 2014, Accepted 12 August 2014, Available Online 4 November 2014.
- DOI
- 10.1016/j.joat.2014.08.001How to use a DOI?
- Keywords
- Africa; Trade; Statistics; GDP
- Abstract
African trade statistics suffer from errors of commission and omission. A quarter-century ago, Alexander Yeats (1990) compared receipts of importers and exporters and concluded that the data could not be used to determine the magnitude, direction, or composition of trade. The only fact to be safely deduced from the evidence was that the statistics were plagued by widespread smuggling and/or underreporting. More than two decades later, despite improvement in external economic conditions, trade statistics continue to be lacking in quality.
- Copyright
- © 2014 Afreximbank. Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
- Open Access
- This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC license (http://creativecommons.org/licences/by-nc/4.0/).
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Cite this article
TY - JOUR AU - Morten Jerven PY - 2014 DA - 2014/11/04 TI - On the accuracy of trade and GDP statistics in Africa: Errors of commission and omission JO - Journal of African Trade SP - 45 EP - 52 VL - 1 IS - 1-2 SN - 2214-8523 UR - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.joat.2014.08.001 DO - 10.1016/j.joat.2014.08.001 ID - Jerven2014 ER -