Most of the literature that explored the relationship between financial development and economic growth taking into consideration the roles played by institutional quality in the ECOWAS region still debates on the roles of institutional quality on economic growth. This study used data from 1996-2017 for 15 emerging economies within the ECOWAS by applying two-step SYS GMM (SGMM) estimators. The following conclusions were developed: first, the study discovered that financial development has no significant and positive impact on economic growth in the ECOWAS region. Secondly, regulatory quality and control of corruption, which are considered as institutional quality variables, have opposing results with control of corruption reducing growth as well as regulatory quality variable increasing growth. Again, the results indicate that capital formation has a positive association with growth and labor force influencing growth negatively. Finally, due to a lack of proper corruption control systems in the region and poor financial sector development, growth cannot improve.

The focus of the current study is to empirically examine the impact of Human Development on Economic Growth and Development in African countries, between 1990 and 2015. The key findings and results of the study suggested the existence of a positive and significant impact of human development on economic growth and development in Africa. The study employed Human Development Index as the main variable of interest with GDP considered as the dependent variable with inflation, capital, investment and labour as control variables. The study also came out with the findings that Labour and foreign aid also have a positive and significant relationship with growth as recorded by most researchers. It was recommended that more efforts should be placed on developing the human capacities in all areas.

The purpose of the study is to indicate how foreign investment impact on economic growth in some selected African economies. Research Design & Methods: The study employed the Panel ARDL (PMG) technique to estimate the impact of foreign investment proxy as FDI net inflows on Growth measured as GDP per capita. Findings: The results of Panel ARDL indicate that foreign investment has a positive impact on economic growth as well as a positive sign of trade openness, inflation, and labor. The study stresses that for increasing economic growth there is a need to seek more foreign investments, increase trade openness and inflation at the same time improve upon employment conditions in selected African developing countries. Contribution & Value Added: The novelty of this research is in presenting and emphasizing the significance of FDI in some selected African countries on economic growth. Article type: research paper