Qualitative research paper - Essay Example

Qualitative research paper The qualitative research paper analyzed in this paper is “Risk, FDI and Economic Growth: A Dynamic Panel Analysis of the Determinants and Growth Impact of FDI in Africa” by Kevin N. Lumbila. The study has been done in order to determine the FDI flows to Africa, FDI determinants and role of country risk and the contribution of FDI to the economic growth of Africa. The study addressed the issues of the growth convergence and the extent to which FDI contributed faster growth in Africa and sector-wise distribution of FDI.

Research designThe topic of the study is very important with respect to the African countries where the population living below the poverty line is more than fifty percent of the total population. The lacks of opportunity for strengthening the financial condition of the individuals have multiple implications on the social lives of individuals. The FDI helps in the inflow of money in the economic cycle resulting in the acceleration of the economic growth as well employment opportunities. The literature review section of the study covered various theories and models of FDI and growth of an economy.

The determinants of FDI like cross border investment issues, collaborative ventures and various important issues to understand the determinants of FDI was discussed in the first section followed by the Growth Empirical Modeling where the Growth empirical approach, the Intertemporal Optimization approach and the Panel Data Analysis approach has been studied. The gaps of the models have been identified and argued in this section and the conceptual framework of the study is prepared. The main section of the paper is the chapter following Literature review.

The factors determining FDI flows to Africa and threshold issues for the foreign investors have been studied here. Identify the research question:The approaches identified for the determinants of FDI has been aggregate econometric analysis, survey appraisal of foreign investors’ opinion and econometric study at the industry level of the study. Researcher has focused on the determinants of FDI and singled out the impact of risk of FDI between Africa and other regions. Data Analysis procedures The study has been based on the Aggregate Econometric Approach.

According to this approach the basic determinants of the inflow of FDI in a particular country or a region are dependent factors of the size and growth of market and openness of the country at the primary level and various other factors like host country investment environment, factor endowments, infrastructure and technology and country risk at the secondary level. The various risks like inflation, exchange rate, regulation risks and other risks impacting FDI has been investigated in the paper and tested with their explanatory power.

The research methodology studies the variations in long-run rates of the economic growth across the countries by Levine and Renelt (1992, Easterly et al (1993) and Easterly and Levine (1997) (as cited in the paper, pg 49).This method allowed better understanding of the phenomenon and development of valid theories. The generalization is possible with the qualitative researches by the data analysis (Smaling, 2002, pg 3).The researcher was able to meet the two main objectives of the study i.e.:Identifying the factors determining FDI flows to Africa empiricallyAssessing the impact of FDI on economic growthThe panel data analysis helped in identifying the determinants of the FDI and impact of FDI on economic growth in Africa.

The mixed results of panel data analysis were generated for different recipients of the FDI in Africa for instance the larger recipients like Angola and Nigeria were not the fast growing economies. Openness to trade, domestic investment and infrastructure are the other critical determinants of FDI in Africa. The FDI in the fast growing sector has been more as compared to the other sectors. The data has been to be collected from the credible sources. The transferable results could be generalized.

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