Manufacturing has made an important contribution to raising living standards in many parts of the world. Concerns about premature deindustrialization have made some observers skeptical about the potential for manufacturing to play this role in Africa. But employment in African manufacturing has grown rapidly over the past 20 years. These employment gains have been accompanied by: (i) large increases in the number of small manufacturing firms; (ii) limited employment gains in large firms; and (iii) robust labor productivity growth in Africa’s large firms. Limited employment growth in Africa’s large manufacturing firms is partly a result of the capital intensity of the manufacturing subsectors in which African countries are most engaged—the processing of resources—and partly a result of rising capital intensity in manufacturing. The potential for manufacturing to raise living standards in Africa depends on indirect job creation by large firms through backward and forward linkages and increasing labor productivity in small firms.

中文翻译：

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非洲的劳动生产率增长和工业化

制造业为提高世界许多地区的生活水平做出了重要贡献。对过早去工业化的担忧使一些观察家对制造业在非洲发挥这一作用的潜力持怀疑态度。但过去 20 年来，非洲制造业的就业人数迅速增长。这些就业增长伴随着：(i) 小型制造企业数量的大幅增加；(ii) 大公司的就业增长有限；(iii) 非洲大公司的劳动生产率增长强劲。非洲大型制造企业的就业增长有限，部分原因是非洲国家参与最多的制造业子行业（资源加工）的资本密集度，部分原因是制造业资本密集度上升。