The vast majority of micro and small enterprises (MSEs) in developing countries are located in industrial clusters, and the majority of such clusters have yet to see their growth take off. The performance of MSE clusters is especially low in Sub-Saharan Africa. While existing studies often attribute the poor performance to factors outside firms, problems within firms are seldom scrutinized. In fact, entrepreneurs in these clusters are unfamiliar with standard business practices. Based on a randomized experiment in Ghana, this study demonstrates that basic-level management training improves business practices and performance.

Tenancy markets provide an opportunity to trade land between labor-scarce farm households and labor-abundant households. In China and other rapidly growing countries in Asia where rural to urban migration is becoming active, facilitating well-functioning tenancy markets is important to increase farm size and farmer’s income. In China, however, individual land rights are weak and in many communities land may be reallocated by village leaders to other households if it is rented out. We hypothesize that the risk of expropriation of rented-out land is a major constraint on land rental transactions in China. We find empirical evidence in support of this hypothesis using farm household data.

No abstract