This work is a study of the agro-based industries and their future prospects in relation to the industrialization process in the Sudan. It considers the historical' background of the emergence of the modern manufacturing sector with emphasis on the 1970-83 period. This period witnessed the formulation of an industrialization strategy explicitly emphasizing a central role for industries based on the processing of agricultural raw materials. Processing of agricultural products as a distinct path to industrialization has been more advocated than studied. This thesis questions the rationale behind such path and its suitability as a strategy of industrialization for late late comers. The study suggests an alternative framework for re-examining such rationale with reference to and in light of the wider debate on trade and development strategies; interpretation of the historical experiences; and trends in technical change. The study examines the complex interaction of internal and external factors at the level of strategy formulation, implementation, and operation-that led to the present industrialization impasse. In doing so it suggests that the stagnation and decline in primary production is central to the understanding of that of the pattern of ·development of the manufacturing sector. On the question of performance, the thesis shows that despite vigorous expansion in the production capacities of the agro-based industries, its output grew at an extremely low rate during the 1970s. Capacity utilization was held down and the manufacturing sector actual capacity to supply goods and services for the economy and for itself declined sharply and because of built-in biases, the strategy led to the accentuation of regional disparities and reinforced the inherited lop-sided structure of the economy. The study shows that the profitability in the commodity producing sectors was maintained and/or augmented by direct state action made possible because of favourable external financial inflows. However, with the slow down in external financial inflows,' mounting external debts, building up of import intensities throughout the production structure and the decline in the state's accumulative and allocative capacities such pattern of reproduction became far less feasible. Furthermore, the study shows that the potential for rapid extensive expansion of agriculture, that eased the accumulation crisis in the 1960s and made possible its phase of industrialization, has shown clear signs of exhaustion. ( Finally the study concludes that the agro-based industries can only be a component of a broader industrialization strategy that encompasses the simultaneous building up of those branches that are capable of expanding its capacity and that of the whole economy, servicing and supplying it with the skills necessary for its efficient operation.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:234600 |
| Date | January 1988 |
| Creators | Ibrahim, I. E. |
| Publisher | University of Sussex |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
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