While regional integration is viewed as a tool to foster growth and poverty reduction, tensions are recognised within the literature, including potential increased economic volatility, economic divergence among countries, and increased inequalities within countries.
This paper reviews the literature describing the pathways of impacts between regional infrastructure, growth and poverty by:
Discussing the importance and relevance of addressing trade constraints at the regional scale;
Gathering evidence from the literature about the pathways of impact of the reduction of trade costs resulting from investments in regional infrastructure;
Reviewing evidence on growth and poverty reduction, looking at the effects at both micro and macro scales.