Africa and business: can African entrepreneurs lead a new era of economic development?

Africa and business: can African entrepreneurs lead a new era of economic development?

This conference explored the significant potential for African entrepreneurship to drive economic development, despite persistent barriers like fragmented markets, insufficient infrastructure, and a lack of deep, liquid capital. The central challenge identified was overcoming fragmentation to enable business development and scale, requiring aggregation across supply chains, logistics, and training to create resilient business ecosystems. The event focused on how global trends, notably digitisation and a youthful population, could enable this private sector mobilisation. Participants stressed the urgent need for 'patient capital' or long-term stable investment, with a core group agreeing to explore a pooled fund of African money to address domestic investment opportunities. Key to sustained growth is moving away from an overreliance on exporting raw materials towards investment in local skills, manufacturing, and finished products. Sectors such as renewable energy, healthcare, and agriculture were highlighted for significant potential. The ambition for economic integration via a fully functioning African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) was strongly supported, and partners were urged to increase their insufficient engagement by supporting market access for African products and providing capital without imposing exploitative conditions.