Human Resource Development and Economic Growth in South Asia: A Panel Data Analysis

Abstract

Do economic growth of India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Pakistan influence by Human Resource Development (HRD)? If yes, could we meaningfully estimate such an association? To answer these questions, we utilize apanel of cross-country dataset during1990-2023 period. We sourced Data for all variables from the World Development Indicators and Global This research has taken economic growth as regressand and the human development index as primary regressor. Simultaneously, gross fixed capital formation and trade openness are control variables. To avoid spurious regression, stationarity is assessed using the Augmented Dickey-Fuller (ADF) test, and long-run relationships are analyzed using the Johansen Cointegration Test. We find that there is a long-run relationship between human resource development and economic growth in South Asia as per the Cointegration test. The random-effect estimates indicate that enhanced human resource development, gross fixed capital formation, and trade openness stimulate economic growth. In addition, regional disparities in South Asia must be addressed so that the benefits of economic growth and human resource development are fairly distributed across the nations.