One reason that aid could slow economic growth is “Dutch disease,” a term The Economist coined to describe a decline in the Dutch economy in the 1960s after natural gas was discovered in the North Sea off the country’s coast. This valuable natural resource should have been a great economic boon, but in fact, as the revenues from gas exports began flowing in, Dutch manufacturing slumped. The reason, according to economists, was that as other countries bought Dutch oil, sending money into the country, the value of the Dutch currency rose relative to that of the country’s main trading partners,
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