Growth de profundis: “inaccessibility corridors” for the world economy
“No region and no one should be left behind in the march toward common prosperity.” – Xi Jinping (President of China)
“We must move the heart of our nation inward, breaking the chains of geography to unite our people and economy.” – Juscelino Kubitschek (Former President of Brazil)
“It is only by spreading the benefits of progress to the remotest corners that a nation can truly prosper.” – Jawaharlal Nehru
The paradigm of global economic development in the past centuries largely focused on the accelerated expansion of the coastal regions of the world that were the main drivers of international trade. According to existing estimates, twelve of the world’s fifteen megacities are located along coastal areas, while the global distribution of economic activity points to economic activity being largely concentrated along coastal areas and navigable waterways[1]. The share of GDP in “near regions”/coastal regions (accounting for 18.4% of the world’s landmass) amounted to 63% in 2018[2]. Such a concentration of economic activity is fraught with the risks of regional inequality and the rising susceptibility of the world economy to the effects of climate change. There may also be political and electoral implications from such imbalances, with voters in inland regions typically becoming more averse to globalization.
The continental poles of inaccessibility
One of the ways to deliver a stronger impulse to the development of inland regions is via infrastructural connectivity and regional economic integration. In this respect, connecting some of the most remote regions in the different continents of the world economy could strengthen such a rebalancing momentum while addressing socio-economic disparities at the national, regional and global levels. The most remote regions in the respective continents could be represented by the continental poles of inaccessibility (locations in the respective continents that are the farthest from the ocean and any coastline) that include the following (phase A):
· Eurasia: Near Ürümqi, China (China-Mongolia-Russia-Kazakhstan border area)[3]
· Africa: Near Obo, in the Central African Republic
· South America: Near Arenapolis, in Brazil’s Mato Grosso region
· North America: Near Allen, in South Dakota, USA
· Australia: Near Alice Springs, Northern Territory
· Antarctica: The “Southern Pole of Inaccessibility”
A platform of economic cooperation among such remote regions of the world economy could involve the creation of “inaccessibility corridors” directed at the development of trade and transportation routes as well as the digital and institutional connectivity. There may also be scope for the platform to facilitate the exchange of best practices and cooperation in the energy sphere, including solar and other sustainable energy generation. Other benefits in connecting some of the most remote areas with regional peers and with the global economy may have to do with the creation of new growth centers/growth poles, the diversification of economic activity and building more robust climate resilience.
An alternative way (phase B) to build a network of inaccessibility corridors would be to connect the continental nodes that lie at the juncture of the border crossings of in-land regions and landlocked economies in the respective continents. In this respect, there is an intriguing pattern of the proximity of the continental poles of inaccessibility to such nodes that lie at the border crossing of landlocked countries across the three continents of the developing world – Africa, Eurasia and South America:
- In Eurasia, the continental pole of inaccessibility lies close to the intersection between four regional economies: China, Russia, Mongolia, Kazakhstan (two of them – Kazakhstan and Mongolia – being the largest landlocked economies by area size in the world).
- In South America, the regional pole of inaccessibility is not too far off from the intersection of the borders of Brazil, Paraguay and Bolivia (the latter two being the landlocked economies in South America).
- In Africa, the continental pole of inaccessibility lies close to the juncture that connects South Sudan, the Central African Republic, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (the former two being landlocked, with latter having large swathes of remote regions).
The respective border regions lying close to the continental poles of inaccessibility include:
· Eurasia: Near Ust’-Chindagatuy, Kazakhstan (China-Mongolia-Russia-Kazakhstan border area)
· Africa: Near Ezo, South Sudan
· South America: Near Puerto Suarez, Bolivia or Bahia Negra, Paraguay or Corumba, Brazil
The resulting “inaccessibility corridors” of the Global South could then have a multiplier effect in addressing connectivity needs of several landlocked economies in the region via infrastructure development, trade diversification (most notably in the direction of South-South trade), and greater connectivity not only to regional but also global counterparts. There could also be scope for creating Special Economic Zones (SEZs) in such border areas in remote locations for the integration of such regions into the world economy and for attracting capital and labor to the new emerging growth poles. Connecting such SEZs at the global level via a cooperative platform may allow for pooling of resources and international policy coordination to expand the geography of economic development.
Bringing it all together
A further improvement (phase C) on the above frameworks for “inaccessibility corridors” is the connection of the key inland hubs with proximity and infrastructural connectivity to as many landlocked regions/countries of the respective continents as possible. Rather than basing the regional node on solely geographic principles of remoteness, greater weight in determining such connectivity nodes would have to do with the regional economic role of the urban center and its ability to facilitate the connectivity and economic integration of neighboring landlocked and remote regions. The respective key nodes that could address these goals may be:
· Eurasia: Almaty, Kazakhstan or Tashkent, Uzbekistan
· Africa: Ndjamena, Chad – in view of the relative proximity to the landlocked economies in Western and Central Africa
· South America: Santa Cruz, Bolivia or Campo Grande, Brazil
· North America: Kansas City, USA or Winnipeg, Canada
· Australia: Alice Springs, Northern Territory
There may be further modalities in building the “inaccessibility corridors” across the global economy by exploring the potential for digital connectivity and environmental development (most of the border junctures and inaccessibility poles in Africa, South America and Eurasia are close to Nature Parks and Reserves). Geographically, there is also scope to further expand the network of “inaccessibility corridors” via targeting regional and sub-regional nodes of remote regions in South Asia, Middle East, Northeastern/Northern Eurasia. Such an approach to development may improve the prospects of some of the ongoing connectivity efforts and corridors such as the Northern Sea Route or the International North-South Corridor in Eurasia.
Overall, the above modalities of the inaccessibility corridors could all be incorporated into one single global framework of connectivity and inclusive development. The first step would involve the implementation of phase C, whereby connectivity corridors are created among the established and prominent regional hubs across the main continents of the world economy. The second phase may involve the realization of phase B – the creation of SEZs in the border areas connecting landlocked economies and incorporating these nodes into the network of phase C corridors. The implementation of phase A would further raise the penetration of such a network of corridors to the more remote inland areas. The missing link within this framework (let’s call it phase D) would be the corridors connecting the phase C nodes with inland routes and coastal ports/hubs that have advanced/established infrastructure or with logistical hubs that could be created to improve the efficiency of the resulting transportation framework.
The pursuit of the development of inland regions via connectivity projects dovetails initiatives such as China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) that have contributed significantly to addressing the “connectivity gaps” in the heart of Eurasia, most notably in Central Asia. China has also been active in shifting its regional economic policy from the prioritization of the growth in coastal regions toward developing inward regions/areas. This inward drive by China may have accounted for some of the growth in the share of the inland regions in the global economy’s GDP – by 2018 it increased from 32.75% in 2000 to 36.98% in 2018[4].
With intra-continental efforts to build gateways and connectivity to remote inland regions likely encountering resource constraints and limitations (particularly in Africa and South America), there may be potential dividends from building a global network for the modernization of such regions. The framework of “inaccessibility corridors” could also serve as a platform for development institutions (globally and from the Global South) that could co-finance large-scale connectivity projects in view of their high financing requirements as well as environmental concerns that this sizeable connectivity effort may entail. Such cooperation among the regional development institutions could also focus on reconciling the various connectivity projects such as the BRI, B3W, Global Gateway. The creation of a platform for remote regions and the development of inaccessibility corridors may also allow for a greater penetration of global growth and coordinated stimuli (such as the G20 stimuli) to reach some of the most remote inland parts of the world economy.
Remote regions as start-ups
The framework of inaccessibility corridors offers the possibility of relaunching the development of the global connectivity framework making it more pre-meditated/planned/coordinated compared to the system that has evolved thus far. It also offers a de novo paradigm for globalization that may allow for a more sustainable and technologically advanced connectivity system to emerge in case it is accompanied by the creation and advancement of “smart cities”, digital clusters and renewable energy hubs in these remote locations. This de novoframework of connectivity would take the pressure from the overloaded existing hubs (such as Suez or Panama canals) and provide greater optionality in the system of global transportation logistics.
The pattern of growth impulses emanating de profundis from inland regions may hence provide a new growth track for the world economy – higher growth may emanate not only from greater investment, but also from the catch-up growth of the remote areas with relatively low starting levels of development. There may also be important “multiplier effects” for the wider region from the propagation of growth impulses across bordering inland countries and regions via trade and connectivity channels. With due transportation infrastructure development, incorporating such remote regions into the regional and global value chains may render growth more inclusive, while also providing scope for more of the growth impulses to be shared across the neighboring regions and economies. Stimuli that target the development of inward/inland regions may also be associated with lower leakage and greater multiplier effects compared to similar stimuli in the more open and accessible coastal regions.
The framework of inaccessibility corridors may provide a basis for accelerated catch-up development of new environmental and digital economies, with remote regions allowing for de novo development that is not encumbered by “legacy systems” of the “old economy”. With future economic growth becoming increasingly digital and in need of being sustainable and ecological, remote regions may exercise a comparative advantage vs the more populated, congested and developed regions in launching de novo impulses of economic transformation in the sphere of digital and environmental development. To make the comparison between the regional and the corporate worlds – if the coastal developed regions may be considered as “incumbents”, remote inland regions may be likened to potential start-ups. The “inaccessibility corridors” approach may thus enable the world economy to close some of the key gaps and imbalances in global economic development – such as the “digital gap”, “the infrastructure gap”, as well as address the lingering “voids of economic integration”.
Overall, the pursuit of the “inaccessibility corridors” project for the global economy as well as the Global South could mark a turning point in the paradigm of economic development, whereby rather than the coastal regions being the main focal points of connectivity internationally, there is more scope provided to inland regions to drive such connectivity. This paradigm would rebalance the distribution of economic activity and GDP across regions (between coastal and inland regions) and would contribute to greater economic convergence. It would also render the global economy more resilient to the adverse effects of climate change that disproportionately affects the coastal regions of the world. A global platform for building “inaccessibility corridors” would also bring together the countries of the Global South (most notably China, Brazil) with the advanced economies (US, Australia). Perhaps most importantly, the pattern of economic development would be rendered more inclusive, balanced and supportive for regional economic integration in some of the more isolated regions of the world economy.
Yaroslav Lissovolik, Founder, BRICS+ Analytics
Image by TheDigitalArtist via Pixabay
[1] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41599-023-02234-4#:~:text=However%2C%20the%20proportion%20of%20GDP,36.98%25%20in%202018%20(Figs.
[2] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41599-023-02234-4#:~:text=However%2C%20the%20proportion%20of%20GDP,36.98%25%20in%202018%20(Figs.
[3] The continental pole of inaccessibility in Eurasia is also the global pole of inaccessibility.
[4] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41599-023-02234-4#:~:text=However%2C%20the%20proportion%20of%20GDP,36.98%25%20in%202018%20(Figs.
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