Book Description

First published in 1999. Firms in manufacturing industries are influenced by the market-oriented liberalization reform policies in many developing countries since the late eighties. However, studies applying appropriate methodology to appropriate data seldom analyze the impact of reforms on the performance of production units such as manufacturing firms. The central point of this book is to address this issue by comparing firms’ achievement with 'best practice' performance before and after reforms. This form of analysis is not new but it emphasizes a new focus or realignment of thinking within neoclassical economics to develop an analytical framework. This book examines the productivity growth of Bangladesh manufacturing firms as component measures of changes in capacity realization and technical progress. The significant feature of this approach is that it allows for the inefficiency of firms, and thus productivity growth is estimated rather than taking it as a residual as is usually measured in the traditional growth accounting approach. High rates of technological progress, on the one hand, can co-exist with low rates of capacity realization. On the other hand, relatively low rates of technological progress can co-exist with an improving capacity realization. As a result specific policy actions are required to address the difference in the sources of variation in productivity. In this respect this book would provide invaluable insights for policy makers, development practitioners, academics and students of economics.