How Africa Tweets
At the 2012 World Economic Forum’s Annual Meeting in Davos last week, a record 2,600 global leaders discussed a frenetic mix of economic and social issues facing the global community. A number of panels (some of which were overlooked with all the talk of the unfolding Eurocrisis) focused on the important transition Africa is making from an underdeveloped continent to one characterized by sustained growth — backed by strong trade and investment flows.
Leaders discussed the need for greater market integration to increase intra-African trade and better cooperation on infrastructure to facilitate investment and trade. Alpha Condé, President of Guinea, called for the establishment of Pan-African ministries to drive greater integration and coordination on the continent. “At the next African union meeting, we must consider establishing three of four ministers for all of Africa,” he said. “These new posts should at least cover energy, infrastructure, and trade in Africa.”
The Chinese New Year of the dragon has also just begun. People born in the year of the dragon are said to be innovative, enterprising, and respected. Africa in 2012 holds promise to further unlock these same qualities and boost growth and development in the year ahead. Let’s look at what can make that happen.
(via Africa’s big spenders)
This, he said, could be achieved through the commercial and Small and Medium Enterprise sector if they focus on reaching the highly untapped mass market.
Mr Wessels, who was interacting with journalists in Accra on Friday, said findings from a study by RBSC had shown that about $60 billion could be mobilised from more than 400 million low earners each year in sub-Saharan Africa.
He said: “Commercial banks can win millions of new customers in Africa by using integrated strategies for the mass market, especially as four out of five adults in Ghana, Tanzania, Kenya, Nigeria and other sub-Saharan African countries either have no access to banking services or prefer informal alternatives. This amounts to (more than) 400 million people who represent untapped potential for banks.”
SPIEGEL: Where are Africans supposed to get money if development aid dries up?
Moyo: They should get a credit rating to show that they want to be fully integrated into global financial markets. As a second step, they could issue bonds. The financial market would penalize those countries that failed to redeem them later.
SPIEGEL: How realistic is it to expect that American retirement funds or German insurance companies will someday invest their money in Liberia or Malawi?
Moyo: Sixty percent of Africans are younger than 24 years old. They are burning to become part of the global Facebook-Twitter community. They want to have plasma TVs like young people in Europe. Africa is a market. The West is missing its chance here.
SPIEGEL: We’re talking about a continent on which there is war, murder and rape in many places.
Moyo: Much of that is exaggerated. What are the images we get about Africa from TV? Usually it’s just flies on the face of some starving child in Somalia. Have you recently heard any good news coming out of Africa?
SPIEGEL: No one can argue that there aren’t all sorts of wars and crises on the continent. Do you really think that market forces can correct the things that have gone wrong there?
Moyo: I believe the market can have a disciplining effect. Whoever governs poorly will be eliminated. If this were the case, investors would have to say: “We won’t invest any money in your country until you solve your problems.” In that way, Africans would experience what some European countries are going through right now.
—Ed’s note: What on earth has this whole tumblr been tracking for the past year, Der Spiegel? Your blind prejudices are showing
“But actually nobody ever made money from following the herd and the most money is often to be made where there is a mismatch between what people perceive to be the place and the reality of what it is, and Somaliland is exactly in those kinds of circumstances where there is a huge gap between the reality and the perception.” “So actually there is a method to my madness and it isn’t inconsistent with the basic principles of business: Go find yourself a situation that nobody else has spotted and be prepared to hang on in there while everybody else catches up.” (via BBC News - The joys of investing in Somaliland)
“They will have a significant impact on global trade patterns in the next decade,” said Ajen Sita, Ernst & Young CEO for Africa.
“They will lead the global economy out of the crisis,” he said.
But he cautioned that Africa was “not getting its fair share” of global foreign direct investment and needed higher growth and better scale in this area.
“It doesn’t reflect the investment potential Africa offers,” he said.
Africa’s share of new project announcements in 2010 was just 4.5% from 4.9% in 2009.
The session on Africa, chaired by Gordon Brown, a former UK prime minister, brought together presidents of South Africa (Jacob Zuma), Guinea (Alpha Conde) and Tanzania (Jakaya Kikwete) and prime ministers of Kenya (Raila Odinga) and Ethiopia (Meles Zenawi).
While it is true that the SSA’s transformation has only just begun to take off and faces a number of political and institutional challenges, SSA might be slowly emerging as the next “growth pole” of the global economy, according to Ethiopia’s Meles Zenawi.
