AU (African Union) Launches its Diplomatic Mission to the United States

AU Launches its Diplomatic Mission to the United States

African Union (Addis Ababa)
PRESS RELEASE
10 July 2007
Posted to the web 10 July 2007
Washington, D.C.
The African Union (AU) will officially launch its Diplomatic Mission to the United States on July 11, 2007.   Senior officials of the AU Commission including Prof. Alpha Oumar Konare, Chairperson of the Commission, are expected to be in the country for the launching ceremonies.

Officials of the Bush Administration and Members of the Congress, including Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, Jendayi Frazer, and Congressman Donald Payne, Head of the Sub-Committee on Africa and Global Health of the House of Representatives, are also expected to attend the ceremonies.

Established in 2002 as a successor to the Organization of African Unity, the African Union, according to its vision, seeks to “build an integrated Africa, a prosperous and peaceful Africa, driven by its own citizens and representing a dynamic force in the international arena.”   In the Fall of 2006, Dr. Cindy Courville, former Senior Director for Africa at the National Security Council was appointed as the first United States Ambassador accredited to the African Union.   During her confirmation hearing before the U.S. Senate, Dr. Courville said   the decision to establish diplomatic ties with the African Union was a reflection of the fact that “Africa holds growing geostrategic importance and is a high priority of this administration”   The African Union Ambassador to the US,   Ambassador Amina Salum Ali of the United Republic of Tanzania, who took up assignment in Washington, DC in November 2006, has described the establishment of diplomatic ties between the African Union and the United States as a significant step toward promoting greater understanding between the peoples of the United States and Africa.

The launching ceremonies will be held at The Capitol Hilton, located   at 1001 16th Street, N.W. Washington, DC.   For more information regarding the program and the AU Mission, please contact, Louise S. Bailey, Senior Policy Officer, (202) 429 7138.

Mozambique: World Bank Funds (100 Million US) for Road Program

World Bank Funds for Road Programme

Agencia de Informacao de Mocambique (Maputo)
NEWS
10 July 2007
Posted to the web 10 July 2007
Maputo
The Mozambican government signed with the World Bank on Monday an agreement for funding of 100 million US dollars for the second phase of the country’s road and bridge management and maintenance programme to run between 2007 and 2011.

The document was signed by Mozambican Planning and Development Minister Aiuba Cuereneia and the World Bank representative in Mozambique, Michael Baxter.

This money will also be used to strengthen the Mozambican government’s institutional capacity to manage transport and to promote the use of local resources in road construction and maintenance.

Speaking after the ceremony, Baxter said that this loan is part of the World Bank’s policy to create good conditions on Mozambican roads in order to facilitate marketing and the circulation of people and goods.

For his part, Cuereneia said that the agreement represents an important step towards the government’s objective of reducing transaction costs.

The money comes from the World Bank’s soft loans agency, the International Development Association (IDA). It is payable over 40 years at an interest rate of one per cent.

The agreement was signed after the appointment last week of a new board of directors and a new chief executive officer of Mozambique’s National Roads Authority (ANE).

Francisco Pereira, chairperson of the government’s Road Fund, cited in the independent newsheet “Mediafax”, said that the World Bank loan would be disbursed in six monthly instalments.

The Road Fund expected to receive the first instalment in September.

He made it clear that the restructuring of the ANE had been one of the conditions for the agreement.

Pereira said that other donors, such as the European Union, were also now beginning to release funds for the road programme.

He added that, although most donors were supporting the Integrated Road Sector Programme (PRISE) which envisages that, up to 2010, all funds for roads will be channelled through the Road Fund, the United States and Japan still preferred to give their money directly to projects.

The Road Fund, he said, coordinated with the Americans and Japanese via the ANE. Japan is currently planning to invest over 20 million dollars in bridge construction in northern Mozambique.

Mozambique Enters into an Agreement With Chinese University

Agreement With Chinese University

Agencia de Informacao de Mocambique (Maputo)
NEWS
10 July 2007
Posted to the web 10 July 2007
Maputo
A higher school of rural development, offering university degrees, will begin operating next year in the southern Mozambican province of Inhambane, under a memorandum of understanding signed in Maputo on Tuesday between the country’s oldest university, the Eduardo Mondlane University (UEM), and the Sichuan Agricultural University of China.

The purpose of the memorandum is to promote collaboration between the two universities in teaching, research and and other science and technology related activities.

Under the memorandum, the Chinese university pledges to provide all forms of support to the new school that will train students in matters of rural development.

The UEM Vice-Chancellor, Filipe Couto, who signed the memorandum, said that under the agreement China will also support the UEM agronomy, veterinary science and engineering faculties.

The Deputy Vice-Chancellor for Administration and Resources, Angelo Macuacua, said that these three faculties provided the basis of support for the future school of rural development.

According to Couto, the Sichuan university has expressed an interest in supporting efforts to improve the quality of maize grown in Mozambique. This would involve improved seed production and better use of the country’s water resources.

From the Chinese, Couto enthused. Mozambique could learn to move water from rives and lakes to areas frequently affected by drought Wen Xintian, the Vice-Chancellor of the Sichuan Agricultural University, said that the existence of the three key UEM faculties prepared the ground for his university to intervene. He stressed, in particular, the importance of improved seeds for boosting agricultural output.

Macuacua insisted that the new school will begin operation in Vilankulo district, in February 2008, providing bachelors’ degrees. Initially, it will accommodate 300 students.

UN Report: Lesser Developed Countries (LDC’s) Call for End to ‘Trade-Distorting Barriers’

LDCs Call for End to ‘Trade-Distorting Barriers’

United Nations (New York)
PRESS RELEASE
10 July 2007
Posted to the web 10 July 2007
Istanbul
The Ministerial Conference of the Least Developed Countries on “Making Globalisation Work for LDCs” has ended in Istanbul today with a call on the developed countries to eliminate trade-distorting domestic support, export subsidies and all trade-distorting barriers, including export subsidies.

In a Ministerial Declaration adopted at the end of the two-day conference, the LDCs also urged the developed countries to channel increased foreign direct investment to the LDCs and to “enhance the benefits they can derive from such investments, particularly in the areas of capacity building, technology transfer, building and developing infrastructure, entrepreneurship development, employment generation and poverty alleviation.”

The LDCs, which are characterised as the weakest and most vulnerable segment of the international community, demanded greater participation in international economic decision-making and norm-setting.

“We call upon the international community to undertake pragmatic and innovative measures to further enhance their effective participation in international dialogues and decision making processes.”

At the end of the conference, the Turkish Foreign Ministry Undersecretary, Mr. Ertugrul Apakan, said that the conference was only part of the process to address the needs of the Least Developed Countries that will have to be carried on in other international forums.

Reiterating Turkish support to the development of LDCs, he said that Turkey would appoint a coordinator of LDCs in the Foreign Ministry.

(*) This press release was issued by the United Nations Office of the High Representative for the Least Developed Countries, Landlocked Developing Countries and Small Island Developing States. Website: http://www.un.org/ohrlls/

USA State Department: Trade Act Helps Liberalize Continent’s Economies

Trade Act Helps Liberalize Continent’s Economies

United States Department of State (Washington, DC)
NEWS
9 July 2007
Posted to the web 10 July 2007

By Jim Fisher-Thompson
Washington, DC
Strengthening the partnership for economic reforms and development between the United States and 38 African nations is the aim of the sixth annual African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) Forum.

The forum will be held in Accra, Ghana, July 18-19, and U.S. and African officials said activity under AGOA in the host nation spotlights the goals and potential benefits of the law.

Signed into law in May 2000 by President Clinton, AGOA provides duty-free access to American markets for a range of 6,000 African products. Its aim is to spur export-led growth in nations that agree to liberalize their economies.

President Bush extended trade incentives in revisions to the law in 2002 and 2004, and 38 African nations currently are eligible for its benefits.

The forum is an important part of AGOA, said Todd Moss, deputy assistant secretary of state for African affairs, because “it represents an ongoing dialogue between Africa and the United States to ensure that the benefits of AGOA are realized.”

And Ghana, he said, has been in the vanguard of countries that have taken to heart this year’s theme, “As Trade Grows, Africa Prospers: Optimizing Benefits under AGOA.”

As an early partner in the program, the West African nation was able to take advantage of AGOA’s favorable trade benefits, in part, because of macroeconomic and financial reforms undertaken by Ghanaian President John Kufuor, Moss said.

The country is now home to one of four “trade hubs” in Africa operated by the U.S. Agency for International Development as a one-stop shopping center for information on AGOA.

Moss will join other officials, trade experts and business executives at the forum in offering tips and advice on how to gain access to American markets.

U.S. Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns is expected to deliver a keynote address on agricultural trade development under AGOA. The forum also will include a meeting of finance, economic and trade ministers as well as separate sessions hosted by civil society and business groups.

Moss said that AGOA — the first U.S. trade legislation aimed at sub-Saharan Africa — shows the United States “has made Africa one of its priority regions,” adding that, as a result, “relations with the continent are as strong as they have ever been.”

“At no other time in the last 50 years has interdependence between Africa and America been greater,” and AGOA plays an important role in that dynamic, Moss said.

Since AGOA’s implementation in 2001, non-oil exports to the United States from Africa under the program have grown on average 18.7 percent annually, he said. “This is the type of economic momentum that we want to keep going, with the aid of experience and knowledge shared at the upcoming Accra forum,” he added.

The forum host, Ghana, “in particular is a key partner of the United States, and it’s not just on trade but on a whole range of issues, from peace and security to governance and economic growth,” he said.

President Bush made that point when he hosted President Kufuor at an April 2006 White House meeting.

“President Kufuor has done a fantastic job for Ghana,” Bush said. “He’s told the people of his country he’d bring honesty to government, and he has. He told the people of his country that he would work to create a stable economic platform for [development], and he has done that as well.” (See related article.)

Ghana exported $43 million in goods to the United States under AGOA in 2006, representing 24 percent of the country’s total U.S. exports for that year, according to the AGOA 2007 report of the U.S. trade representative (USTR).

USTR said Ghana has “a market-based economy with few barriers to trade and investment,” adding that sound macroeconomic policies and debt relief have resulted in declining inflation and interest rates, a stable currency and real economic growth averaging 5 percent to 6 percent yearly.

The World Bank’s recent Doing Business in 2007 Report also praised Ghana for its economic reforms and improvements in the business climate.

Ghanaian Ambassador Kwame Bawuah-Edusei said that as the first African nation to achieve independence from colonialism 50 years ago, “Ghana led Africa in political emancipation.” Through AGOA, he added, “we’re leading Africa in economic emancipation.”

“Under the leadership of President Kufuor we have had a paradigm shift in our economic and political thinking, leading to a much more investor-friendly atmosphere, and now our nation is open for business,” Bawuah-Edusei said.

Bawuah-Edusei said that Ghana began a range of financial and regulatory reforms, as well as infrastructure improvements, aimed at eliminating supply-side constraints to the economy that had hindered growth in the past. But trade constraints still remain, especially in the areas of storage, transportation and port services.

However, he said, recent deals like the $1 billion investment in Ghana by the Denver-based Newmont Mining Company, offshore oil finds and now direct New York to Accra flights by Atlanta-based Delta Airlines are indicators that Ghana is moving in the right direction.

Small and medium-sized enterprises in areas like textiles, agricultural product processing and information technology assistance also “are very much active in Ghana, and we hope more will follow through,” he said.

(USINFO is produced by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)

Africans in Diaspora Seek Strong Unity Govt

Africans in Diaspora Seek Strong Unity Govt

This Day (Lagos)
NEWS
10 July 2007
Posted to the web 11 July 2007

By Abimbola Akosile
Lagos
Africans in the Diaspora have called on all African Diaspora leaders to support the building a strong Diaspora region that will positively influence the creation of an African government for all African people.

The call, which followed a recent failure by the African Union (AU) leaders to unify Africa under one central government, was made by the convenors of the 2007 Pan Afrikan Movement (PAM) Summit, which is holding in Kingston, Jamaica from July 16-18. The Jamaica summit, according to a statement by the conveners, is expected to have African veteran leaders, scholars, activists, faith leaders, dignitaries, entrepreneurs and students in attendance focusing on Pan African unity in the Diaspora.

The summit leaders summed up the recent 2007 AU Summit’s ‘Grand Debate’ in Ghana for an African government as a bold, noble and an inevitable process that will authentically re-integrate the Diaspora in the AU structure for the future of Africa. Their belief is that if this was not done, Africans everywhere would become more vulnerable to global oppression, thus inviting more imperialist wars in Africa for Africa’s resources.

Speaking on the issue en-route the summit, Dr. Dudley Thompson former Ambassador, Attorney for President Jomo Kenyatta and participant of the 5th Pan African Congress said, “we have a duty to our Motherland to ensure that Africans in the Diaspora do not remain as orphans of Africa, but are treated with dignity and as a source of strength for African unity and power”.

The elder is one of few Pan Africanists alive who has worked for many decades with leaders such as Kwame Nkrumah, Jomo Kenyatta and other major leaders for the liberation and unification of Africa.

The theme of the 2007 Summit is ‘Political Determination – for Cultural and Economic Rebirth’. Some of the key goals are to build a political structure for an African Diaspora Union (ADU) to integrate the Diaspora with Africa; organise cultural campaigns and institutions for African people to promote African values, heritage, history and spirituality; and promote economic initiatives for businesses, trade and commerce amongst Africans in the Diaspora and Africa.

Some of the key conveners and participants of the 2007 Summit in Jamaica are Dr. Dudley Thompson; and Nana Norma Yaa Farika, former official Diaspora delegate to the OAU 6th Pan African Congress (PAC) & 7th PAC organiser.

Others are Dr. Tony Martin, veteran Pan Africanist of Trinidad; Dr. Leonard Jeffries, Vice President of the Association for the Study of Classical African Civilisations (ASCAC); Prof. James Small, CEO of the Organisation of Afro-American Unity (OAAU); Dr. Julius Garvey, son of the late Marcus Garvey; and other leaders representing the African Union; the Caribbean nations (CARICOM) and Africans from across the Diaspora. The Summit is only the second of a series of annual summits to unify the African Diaspora with Africa. At the 2006 Summit, Dr. Leonard Jeffries proclaimed that we are “participating in the building of an African World Community” and Elombe Brath added that the 2006 Summit was a ‘historic Pan African gathering to establish a principled and revolutionary position to help prevent the re-colonisation of Africa’.

Other key leaders and participants of the 2006 Summit were Prof. James Small, OAAU; Dr. Shelby Lewis, Africa Advisor & Consultant; Minister Akbar Muhammad, Nation of Islam; Traditional High Priest Wande Abimbola of Nigeria; and Cardinal Mbuyi Chui, Shrine of the Black Madonna/Pan African Orthodox Christian Church (PAOCC).

The Summit in Jamaica, according to the statement, is also the celebration of the 107th anniversary of the first Pan African Conference and Congress in July 1900 in England. The 1900 Conference was the first bold attempt by Pan Africanists to build a blueprint for a global coordinated movement for the liberation and re-unification of Africans.

The primary goal stated at the 1900 Pan African Conference was to ‘protect Africa from the depredations of empire builders’. The recent AU Summit was a failed attempt to implement the original call by Marcus Garvey and later Kwame Nkrumah for a United States of Africa. Indeed, the July AU meeting has demonstrated that many African leaders are still affected by the hypnotic spell of colonialism with little will-power to advance the Pan African vision to its natural stage for an All African Government.

At the 2007 AU summit, Dr. Konare pushed his nationalist position urging the AU leaders to ‘take the bull by the horns’ to unite Africa as one country. The Pan Africanist leaders at the Jamaica Summit intend to build a Secretariat and a Diaspora Pan African Congress of leaders to continue forging the agenda an African union with a continental African government.

The PAM Summit conference addresses, workshops and plenary sessions are expected to be held on July 16-18, 2007 at the University of the West Indies, Kingston; while pre-Summit activities in Jamaica will begin on July 11-15, with African pilgrimages, rallies, and excursions.

West African Private Sector Influence on the Economic Partnership Agreements (EPA’s) or Lack Thereof

West African Private Sector And Epas (11)

This Day (Lagos)
OPINION
10 July 2007
Posted to the web 11 July 2007

By Ken Ukaoha
Lagos
Before we lambast the regional and national governments on the negotiation of the Economic Partnership Agreements (ACPs), there is need for a constructive balance.

First, do the private sector in West Africa realise they are relevant in the EPA discourse? If they do realise, what efforts have they put in place and what have they done to either confront the issues, protect themselves or help provide succour to the environment under which they are operating (even if they are doing this at the level of their commitment or as part of their corporate social responsibility)?

If the private sector has not been able to meet and to review issues and the dynamics of the negotiations since about five years of the EPA dialogue, who went to sleep and who is to be blamed if an awful agreement eventually becomes the outcome? If it is the responsibility of the government to wake the private sector and such governments become negligent, is this a guarantee for the private sector to go to sleep?

Do we have any local or national private sector in West Africa who can boast of conducting impact assessment of EPA on her sectors and providing such information to her government as a guide in the negotiations?

Has any of the private sector deemed it important to convene a meeting of like minds at national or even local levels to appraise the possible effects of EPA on her operators? Were they waiting for resources from their governments or the EU to do these?

This is indeed a shame even as our governments are going cap in hands to the Europen Union (EU) for funds to conduct their own impact assessments studies. Where are the manufacturers? Where are the traders? Where are the Chambers of Commerce and Industries? Where are the farmers organisations? Where are the professional associations in various fields of services?

This reminds one of the West African Traders Association, the West African Chambers of Commerce, the Federation of West African Manufacturers Associations; where have these bodies gone to? Are these bodies only on paper? How active are they to their responsibility and obligation as pressure groups to influencing government policies such as the EPA?

Or are they waiting for the government to wake them up? They must carry their crosses too. Our governments are too busy especially at this period with no time left for frivolity.

Credit must however be accorded ROPPA for giving the region’s farmers a semblance of representation in the EPA process through the provision of briefs and informative materials relating to the agricultural sector.

To appreciate the depth of apathy on the part of the West African private sector, there is need to reflect on the fact that ECOWAS was established precisely on the 28 th of May 1975 and therefore more than 32 years ago therefore, the pursuit of economic integration in West Africa kick-started.

Sadly, till this day, despite the provisions of the ECOWAS Trade Liberalisation Scheme (ETLS), the private sector (particularly the traders and manufacturers) still confront trade impediments at various borders across the region.

The protocols on free movement of goods and services daily face the challenge of corrupt public servants and nothing seems to come from the private sector to challenge or pressure for change in this direction.

Back to the EPAs, there seem to be more fundamental questions that need to be asked by the private sector. These questions include: (i) What does the EPA have in stock for the private sector as potential gains? The answer to the question goes a long way to determine why the private sector must support or fight against EPAs.

This is essential especially in view of the revelation of serious potential effects of the EPA in terms of capital flight which ultimately affects not only the government but also the private sector’s capacity to reinvest for expansion of profits.

Has the EPA negotiators from both sides considered the effects of competition and consequential loss of market to the EU private sector who already possess an intimidating financial muscle, robust infrastructure, technology, research, and subsidy?

Is the EPA cognisant of the fact that the West African famished manufacturer for instance virtually sources her own energy to power her generators, digs her own borehole for water procurement, and sometimes constructs and repairs her own road outlets to the market aside from the heavy tax duty to be paid?

What plans or strategic interventions do the EPA negotiators have in place in practical terms for the local private sector to withstand the ensuing competition after the implementation of the EPAs?

If there are resources created to abridge the foreseen negative fallouts of the EPA, are these funds going to the governments directly? What portion should be made available directly to the private sector and what is their role or take in the management of such resources?

On the other side, are there going to be provisions for infrastructure improvement via the EPAs? What dimension is that going to assume so as to impact on the region’s supply side capacity? The planned UNIDO project for infrastructure in West Africa under the EPA could be a welcome development if well managed alongside the input of the private sector.

In the final analysis, we have heard of project facilities like that of ProInvest, TradeCom, CDE, and even OIF (Francophonie) and the EDF.

The reservation is that whereas these have been existing prior to the possible EPA implementation, it is not clear however what impact they have been able to make in relation to infrastructure upgrading, capacity building, production enhancement, etc in the region.

In this case therefore, one could be a bit unsure of their linkages to the EPA and what they can offer given the bogus, stringent and sometimes ridiculous measures and bureaucracy set out for accessing development funds from them.

Perhaps it is time to begin to measure how many private sector enterprises that have assessed funds from them. If the number is encouraging, then there could be hope for their performance under the EPA regime, but their processes have to be simplified.

As the EPA negotiations approach conclusion, it is not too late for the private sector to engage governments on with debates on concerns and issues like the speed at which trading of goods and services should be liberalised, issue of upgrading the production facilities.

We also have the issues of improving supply capacities and making local products meet international standards, access to market problem and necessary conditions for the development of West African exports, financing of the private sector, the involvement of the sector in the trade negotiations, protection of products made in the region as well as options for Private-Public partnership in the EPA process.

Essentially therefore, it is important to egg the private sector into demanding answers to the many questions raised here, including whether the time-frame is enough for the possible conclusion of a development friendly agreement.

If these questions remain unanswered, then the West African private sector and indeed every other private sector within the ACP configuration should prepare to face a hot battle for existence.

If not, now is the right time to come together, voice out, act and to demand for changes and possible alternatives in the EPAs. Indeed, the West African private sector should learn from their civil society counterparts in the region.

- Ukaoha, National President of the National Association of Nigerian Traders (NANTS), wrote in from Abuja

On the Creation of a “Brand Africa”

Changing ‘Brand Africa’

International Trade Centre (Geneva)
NEWS
11 July 2007
Posted to the web 11 July 2007

By Patricia R. Francis

Ask anyone about Africa and the first response you get is a negative picture of conflict, hunger, HIV/AIDS and other health issues. But question a bit more and it’s clear that Africa is becoming a promising place for business. Africa has been described as the “The Last Big Emerging Market” with great opportunity and potential. The success of the market is essential if we wish to address the biggest challenge of our times: reducing poverty.

Indeed “Brand Africa” needs repositioning, to showcase its champions of successful development and inspire others to realise their potential.

This issue of Trade Forum showcases companies like the publicly listed South African company Johnnic Communications, an African media giant that is a powerful example of the changing “Brand Africa”. The story of a small company like Muya Ethopia, exporting quality home soft furnishing and led by a woman entrepreneur, while not listed on any stock exchange, is the same: strong leadership, contemporary products to match the global market and commitment to local development. This is the new “can do” Africa.

African leaders are on the world stage, investing in new partnerships. In Rwanda, the recent global meeting of women parliamentarians attracted international leaders and showed how African women are leading the charge for responsible governance.

The continent is witnessing the highest growth and investment levels in a long time. Macroeconomic indicators are quite stable, reserves are going up and remittances are the highest ever. Africa is rich in young human resources and entrepreneurial talent. Women entrepreneurs are becoming recognized as a powerful business development force, agents of change in their communities and families.

This is not to underplay the challenges of being home to only 13% of the world’s population, but 30% of its poor. AIDS has had devastating consequences, with the heaviest toll on people of working age. Low literacy is a continuing challenge. Linked to this is the high rate of youth unemployment and low productivity.

Market access barriers are the best-known trade constraints. Some 10 million farmers, the majority of whom are women, are affected by trade distortions in global markets.

Of the world’s poorest 50 countries, 34 are in Africa. Many are land-locked with poor infrastructure like roads, railways, sea and airports, all inhibiting their ability to export competitively. The economies are small, with limited regional cooperation and trade. This is a real barrier to using trade to reduce poverty.

While business taxes in North Africa and the Middle East are the lowest in the world, those in sub-Saharan Africa are the highest. High taxes in the formal sector are one reason why the large informal sector in Africa is not in the mainstream of trade development.

Historically tied to the production of commodities sold to the colonial fathers, there is very limited value addition to both goods and services to meet international standards or market requirements. Trade support institutions generally lack the capacity to help small firms grow and sell across borders.

Today’s “Brand Africa” might be better depicted as a mosaic of contrasts. In that mosaic we find a handful of strong economies, least developed countries — many of them landlocked, some nations at war and some post-conflict countries. Each has its own special circumstances. The strategy to change “Brand Africa” needs to reflect these different realities.

Work with agents of change

September marks the halfway point to achieve the Millennium Development Goals’ targets of reducing poverty and bringing prosperity to the African people. Credible partnerships can bring about lasting change. We must look for change agents to effect the transformation necessary to sustain strong African business while ensuring thriving communities and long-term development.

Critical to this change are financial, regional, academic and research institutions as well as business support institutions and civil society.

• Financial institutions: because the best business ideas go nowhere without the right financing.
• Regional institutions: because we need critical mass to help business compete.
• Academic and research institutions: because they analyse local development challenges and build up a base of skilled professionals.
• Business support institutions and civil society: because a strong private sector and civil society are needed for balanced development.

ITC supports African business

From organic cosmetics made in South Africa’s Eastern Cape, to luxury handbags made by Ethiopian cooperatives, to wooden jewellery made from sustainable Mozambican forests, ITC is partnering with Africans to sell quality “Made in Africa” products around the world.

Our programmes focus on private sector development, regional integration and poverty alleviation. We’ve stepped up initiatives to encourage African businesswomen, bring the voice of business to trade negotiators, facilitate trade between neighbouring countries, develop the potential of trade in services and link poor, rural communities to global markets. In the process, we are reaching out to new players who influence trade and business development in civil society.

Finally, it is essential to work with African institutions to support entrepreneurs. This is part of good governance and of creating a better business environment. ITC works with a range of trade support institutions in Africa to identify winning sectors and improve their services to exporters.

Towards a new “Brand Africa”

If we want to change the future of Africa, it is to homegrown champions that we must look more often. Business developments by Africans, for Africans are immensely powerful. They demonstrate that success is possible and give hope and inspiration to African entrepreneurs who want to follow in their steps. Equally important, these images put more of the challenge of development in the hands of business.

We can be inspired by the business world and put branding front and centre in our thinking. Focusing on a new “Brand Africa” can encourage investment, growth and ensure that it is not “business as usual”.

Inspiring are the words of Benjamin Mkapa, former President of Tanzania… “This is a decisive moment for Africa to commit itself to a strategy of self-dependent path to reducing poverty by scaling up our own efforts through maximizing efficient and effective use of resources. This particularly calls for integrating the African diaspora into resource mobilization plans and in new links with the south nations.”

Prime Minister Meles Zenawi of Ethiopia was also sounding the call for self-reliance when he said at the opening of the recent Economic Commission for Africa summit, “All we need do is believe a little bit more in our capacity to be the authors of our own fate, our own destiny and a little bit less in the possibility of deliverance from outside.” We at ITC stand ready to work with Africa in this exciting process of change.

* Patricia R. Francis is the Executive Director of International Trade Centre. 

 

A Different View of African Aid and Opinions.

BLOGERS NOTE: I am not sure if I agree with this position but I do feel that it needs to have its points aired out in public.

The Article:

What Bono Doesn’t Say About the Continent

Accra Mail (Accra)
OPINION
10 July 2007
Posted to the web 11 July 2007

By William Easterly

JUST WHEN IT SEEMED that Western images of Africa could not get any weirder, the July 2007 special Africa issue of Vanity Fair was published, complete with a feature article on “Madonna’s Malawi.”

At the same time, the memoirs of an African child soldier are on sale at your local Starbucks, and celebrity activist Bob Geldof is touring Africa yet again, followed by TV cameras, to document that “War, Famine, Plague & Death are the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and these days they’re riding hard through the back roads of Africa.”

It’s a dark and scary picture of a helpless, backward continent that’s being offered up to TV watchers and coffee drinkers. But in fact, the real Africa is quite a bit different. And the problem with all this Western stereotyping is that it manages to snatch defeat from the jaws of some current victories, fueling support for patronizing Western policies designed to rescue the allegedly helpless African people while often discouraging those policies that might actually help.

Let’s begin with those rampaging Four Horsemen. Do they really explain Africa today? What percentage of the African population would you say dies in war every year? What share of male children, age 10 to 17, are child soldiers? How many Africans are afflicted by famine or died of AIDS last year or are living as refugees?

In each case, the answer is one-half of 1% of the population or less. In some cases it’s much less; for example, annual war deaths have averaged 1 out of every 10,800 Africans for the last four decades. That doesn’t lessen the tragedy, of course, of those who are such victims, and maybe there are things the West can do to help them. But the typical African is a long way from being a starving, AIDS-stricken refugee at the mercy of child soldiers. The reality is that many more Africans need latrines than need Western peacekeepers – but that doesn’t play so well on TV.

Further distortions of Africa emanate from former British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s star-studded Africa Progress Panel (which includes the ubiquitous Geldof). The panel laments in its 2007 news release that Africa remains “far short” of its goal of making “substantial inroads into poverty reduction.” But this doesn’t quite square with the sub-Saharan Africa that in 2006 registered its third straight year of good GDP growth – about 6%, well above historic averages for either today’s rich countries or all developing countries. Growth of living standards in the last five years is the highest in Africa’s history.

The real Africa also has seen cellphone and Internet use double every year for the last seven years. Foreign private capital inflows into Africa hit $38 billion in 2006 – more than foreign aid. Africans are saving a higher percentage of their incomes than Americans are (so much for the “poverty trap” of being “too poor to save” endlessly repeated in aid reports). I agree that it’s too soon to conclude that Africa is on a stable growth track, but why not celebrate what Africans have already achieved?

Instead, the international development establishment is rigging the game to make Africa – which is, of course, still very poor – look even worse than it really is. It announces, for instance, that Africa is the only region that is failing to meet the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs in aid-speak) set out by the United Nations.

Well, it takes extraordinary growth to cut extreme poverty rates in half by 2015 (the first goal) when a near-majority of the population is poor, as is the case in Africa. (Latin America, by contrast, requires only modest growth to halve its extreme poverty rate from 10% to 5%.)

This is how Blair’s panel managed to call Africa’s recent growth successes a failure. But the reality is that virtually all other countries that have escaped extreme poverty did so through the kind of respectable growth that Africa is enjoying – not the kind of extraordinary growth that would have been required to meet the arbitrary Millennium Development Goals.

Africa will also fail to meet the second goal of universal primary education by 2015. But this goal is also rigged against Africa, because Africa started with an unusually low percentage of children enrolled in elementary school. As economist Michael Clemens points out, most African countries have actually expanded enrollments far more rapidly over the last five decades than Western countries did during their development, but Africans still won’t reach the arbitrary aid target of universal enrollment by 2015. For example, the World Bank condemned Burkina Faso in 2003 as “seriously off track” to meet the second MDG, yet the country has expanded elementary education at more than twice the rate of Western historical experience, and it is even far above the faster educational expansions of all other developing countries in recent decades.

Why do aid organizations and their celebrity backers want to make African successes look like failures? One can only speculate, but it certainly helps aid agencies get more publicity and more money if problems seem greater than they are. As for the stars – well, could Africa be saving celebrity careers more than celebrities are saving Africa?

In truth, Africans are and will be escaping poverty the same way everybody else did: through the efforts of resourceful entrepreneurs, democratic reformers and ordinary citizens at home, not through PR extravaganzas of ill-informed outsiders.

The real Africa needs increased trade from the West more than it needs more aid handouts. A respected Ugandan journalist, Andrew Mwenda, made this point at a recent African conference despite the fact that the world’s most famous celebrity activist – Bono – was attempting to shout him down. Mwenda was suffering from too much reality for Bono’s taste: “What man or nation has ever become rich by holding out a begging bowl?” asked Mwenda.

Perhaps Bono was grouchy because his celebrity-laden “Red” campaign to promote Western brands to finance begging bowls for Africa has spent $100 million on marketing and generated sales of only $18 million, according to a recent report. But the fact remains that the West shows a lot more interest in begging bowls than in, say, letting African cotton growers compete fairly in Western markets (see the recent collapse of world trade talks).

Today, as I sip my Rwandan gourmet coffee and wear my Nigerian shirt here in New York, and as European men eat fresh Ghanaian pineapple for breakfast and bring Kenyan flowers home to their wives, I wonder what it will take for Western consumers to learn even more about the products of self-sufficient, hardworking, dignified Africans. Perhaps they should spend less time consuming Africa disaster stereotypes from television and Vanity Fair.

The writer is a professor of economics at New York University, Visiting Fellow at the Brookings Institution and the author of “The White Man’s Burden: How the West’s Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill and So Little Good”.