Capital Goods, Technological Change and Accumulation in Nigeria

Dakar, CODESRIA, 1994, 204 p., ISBN: 2-86978-032-X (paperback) ISBN: 1-870784-07-3 (cased)

Capital Goods, Technological Change and Accumulation in Nigeria looks at the problems of technology by focusing on developments in the country's capital goods sector. It argues that if underdeveloped countries are to terminate their prostrate external economic dependence and achieve successful industrialisation, it is crucial they develop a local capital goods sub-sector. It also argues that Nigeria is one of the few countries in Africa outside apartheid South Africa with this potential.

Much of the conventional literature in this arena has been incapable of identifying key variables in the economic system apart from the price mechanism, with its tendency to view technology as exogenously' determined. Little or no attention has been paid to the local capacity for the production of goods that will satisfy the need for technologies that are 'appropriate' for development. In this book a research team of social and natural scientists sets out to ask why a society so richly endowed in manpower and natural resources has failed to set up the type of industries that have historically proved crucial to the accumulation and acquisition of technology. Why is it that despite widely publicised declarations of intent and the production of elaborate plans, so little has been done?

Edited by Akin Fadahunsi and B.U.N. Igwe the book brings together major contributions to the debate on economic development in third world countries and is a vital tool for anyone interested or involved in the industrialisation and technological development of African economies.