Bernard Sathekge

Consensus to provide infrastructure development, the removal of trade barriers and creating more diversified economies across Africa was reached during the World Economic Forum (WEF) held in Davos, Switzerland during a forum discussion session on the role of Africa in the global transformation.

The five-day meeting of the WEF dominated by the world’s business heavyweights and political leaders ended on Sunday with Europe’s crippling debt crisis and growing inequalities in Africa as the main discussed issues.

The session, which focused on Africa’s role in an increasingly multipolar world, also agreed in the shifting from distributing Africa’s raw commodities to exporting modified commodities in order for the continent to be competitive with their developed nations counterparts.

Speaking at the forum, South African Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan said there was a huge opportunity for the continent to start picking up dividends as China moved up the value chain and released jobs, enabling African countries to outbid countries like Vietnam for these jobs.

However, warned Gordhan, people must not come to Africa just because it was Africa, but must take into cognisance that the continent needed to create the opportunity for people to partner and that would be the great transformation.

“In the near future, we will need to create jobs for a billion people and we must ensure that there is political will, the institutions and infrastructure that enable us to move into the next epoch of developments in order to bring more value to our exports, for example beneficiation.

“Panellists noted that because of the continent’s size – both in terms of population and land mass – development in Africa needs to be considered at three levels, which include country, sub-regional and pan-regional,” the minister said.

The minister said despite the global economic crisis, which had put pressures on Africa, the current situation in Europe had presented the continent with an opportunity to learn and improve on regional economic integration.

“The world is looking at itself and saying multipolarity is a reality. The recent crisis has shown us that despite the euro, in terms of identity, policy and financial structures in sub-regions in Europe still exist. If financial structures in sub-regions in Europe could survive the current financial meltdown, it means Africa could too if global transformation is purely practice and the right measures are put in place,” he said.

When asked about the common perception that corruption with governments was a key barrier to development in Africa, the minister responded that corruption was not a unique to the continent. “Corruption exists in every country – it is just a question of degree. In Africa, it is an issue and we take it seriously.

“I believe there is an obligation on investors in Africa to help create a better climate and hopeful that we will challenge it more as new leaders emerging in business and politics,” said Gordhan.

The minister was concerned that only 10% of African trade happened in Africa while in Europe this figure was up near 60%. He called on Africa to turn the tables and start investing in the continent rather than be spoon fed by rich nations. Alongside, Geoff Riddell, chairperson of global corporate and CEO of Asia Pacific and Middle East at Zurich Financial Services, concurred with Gordhan on corruption and urged leaders that the more they get cross-country initiatives, the more they must get rid of some of the curses like over-politicisation and corruption.

Riddell agreed that corruption was not only happening in Africa, but pointed to the impact corruption indices had had on governments in the Middle East.

“The economy in Africa is going in the right direction as compared with Europe countries and US.”

bernards@thenewage.co.za