Structural Transformation and Labour Force Reallocation Effects: Evidence From West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU)

This research analyses the effects of structural transformation on sectoral employment and sectoral labour productivity in WAEMU countries. To achieve this, the methodological approach adopted consists of decomposing the economy into three sectors, namely agriculture, industry and services. The results show that the agricultural sector employs 70% of the available labour force as against 10% and 20% respectively for the industrial and service sectors. In terms of value-added, the agricultural (rural) sector and the service sector contribute 40% each against 20% for the industrial sector to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for the Sahelian countries. For all WAEMU countries as a whole, the agricultural sector accounts for 30%, industry for 20% and services for 50%. Reallocation effects show that the service sector is the sector benefiting from a better reallocation of the labour factor. This reallocation effect is very pronounced in Burkina Faso compared to all Sahelian countries and all WAEMU countries.