Brain Drain, Remittances and Economic Growth of West African Countries

Abstract

This study examines the impact of brain drain and remittances on the economic growth of some selected West African countries. The 11 countries used in the study include Nigeria, Ghana, Senegal, Mali, Benin, Niger, Côte d'Ivoire, Gambia, Guinea Bissau, Burkina Faso and Sierra Leone. The data spanned from 1977 to 2016 (40 years). The Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) through the fixed and random effects estimation technique was applied in the data analysis. Pre-estimation and post estimation test were also carried out to ascertain the nature of the data and to examine the robustness of the regression result. The result shows that increase in stock of physical capital, inflation rate and labour force leads to reduction in brain drain, while increase in population growth and real exchange rate promote brain drain. The result also shows that brain drain has no significant impact on education and remittances within the period covered. More so, remittance was found to have indirect impact on economic growth of this region. The study therefore does not find the mitigating impact of remittances for brain drain in West African countries. Rather, a remittance was found to have positive indirect impact on economic growth. Hence, the study concludes that to harness the benefit of remittances, it must be channel to human capital development. In line with the above findings, the study recommends that proper orientations be given on the need to channel the realized remittances to human capital development, as this tends to generate positive impact on economic growth.