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Industry in Africa

  • Industry & Trade Diversification: the key to Africa’s future

    CASABLANCA, 2015/12/02 Industry leaders and policy makers seek to tap world price chains The sea change this year in world commodities markets has profound implications for Africa, a continent endowed with an abundance of natural resources and highly dependent on the export of raw materials. With a lot of economists forecasting a difficult panorama ahead for petroleum and metals producers, they are as well drawing on lessons from completed commodity booms. Compared to other regions, Africa has failed to create long-lasting periods of economic evolution and researchers have seen a strong correlation with market shifts. Half of the continent’s cycles of economic expansions have been linked to booming commodity prices, according to the IMF. The other half has been supported by increased competitiveness, a factor that led to additional sustainable increase in the long-term. Today, Africa faces a fundamentally different world economic landscape than the one that drove it to consistent 5% increase over the completed decade. Additional than ever, African governments and private sectors cannot depend so heavily on the vast wealth held within their territories, and must instead look to diversify their industries.

  • Africa Industrialization Day through the micro lens

    AFRICA, 2015/11/30 Despite my years of research experience on African industrial development, it has come to my attention for the initial time that there has been a long tradition of celebrating Africa Industrialization Day on November 20—each year since 1990! But why celebrate African industrialization? In short, to raise world awareness on the importance and challenges of African industrialization and to stimulate the international community\'s commitment to the industrialization of Africa. In addition, African industrial development contributes to not just in general economic and social development but as well to this year’s theme: Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) for poverty eradication and job creation for women and youth. 1. Why do we care about African industrialization? All nations should have an active industrial policy to achieve sustainable development: Sound industrial policies present Africa opportunities to invest in its human and physical capital formation, in technological innovation, and in supportive institutions. In addition to the merits of industrialization on its own, African industrialization as well helps nations achieve pro-poor increase and safeguards economies against market and climate-related shocks. Thus, African industrialization is essential to spurring increase and improving in general well-being on the continent.

  • South African retailer sees wholesale opportunity at DRC-Zambia border

    CONGO BRAZZAVILLE, 2015/11/20 South African-based grocer Fruit & Veg City is planning on setting up a wholesale centre at Kasumbalesa, the border town between the DRC and Zambia, according to the retailer’s chief of African operations, Frans van der Colff. “I have stood at that border and [watched] trucks arrive and stand there, and they are emptied – they sell everything on the truck before they even cross the border. And people don’t come through the border post, they just run through the bush on the side, buy… and again simply run back and sell on the other side.” The road from Kasumbalesa leads to Lubumbashi, the DRC’s second major city, and Van der Colff said the route is “phenomenally busy”.

  • Why Nigeria is yet to respond to Volkswagen emission scandal

    GERMANY, 2015/10/31 The Nigerian government will national its position on the Volkswagen, VW, emission scandal this week, Joseph Odumodu, the Director General, Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON), has said. Mr. Odumodu, who made statement on Sunday in Abuja in an SMS to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), said the relevant government agencies were “working out something”. The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) had recently discovered that some Volkswagen diesel engine cars on sale in that country had devices that could cheat emission tests. The EPA’s findings cover 482,000 cars in the U.S. alone, inclunding VW brands such as Audi A3, Jetta, Beetle, Golf and Passat.

  • Prime Minister Abdelmalek Sellal

    ALGERIA, 2015/08/24 Prime Minister Abdelmalek Sellal stressed Thursday during his working and inspection visit to the province of Constantine the need to move towards biotechnology, considered as the therapy of the next, to be at the forefront of the field of pharmaceutical industry. While he laid the foundation stone of an insulin unit and inspected a project of a pharmaceutical unit of Saïdal group at the industrial zone of Constantine, Sellal called ob the group managers to vary production and ensure at least 30 % of national production. Prime Minister recalled that Algeria currently has 600-700 public pharmacies, adding that national will focus on production as the management of those pharmacies should be left to professionals.

  • Which Way Should Ethiopia Industrialise?

    ETHIOPIA, 2015/07/13 Lately, the trend of discussions within my circle of friends has changed. In one way or an extra, I find myself discussing industrialisation. This may be a reflection of the change in the economic structure of our equitable country. But it may as well be just because I have friends who love to discuss what is going approaching. As much as I love discussions about Ethiopia's industrialisation, a process that is close to overwhelming us whether we like it or not, there is no clear national ambition on what type of industrialisation ought to be pursued. For starters, by type of industrialisation, I mean the source of capital, sectoral focus, size of production, use of technology, ownership, backward and forward linkages, utilisation of factors of production, location and so on.

  • Renault factory in Morocco stirs controversy in France

    FRANCE, 2015/07/01 The grand opening of Renault factory in Morocco on Thursday stirs controversy in France. The new facility was opened in Tangiers and is aimed at producing new “low cost”models directed to Europe and Africa. With the approaching presidential elections, the issues was addressed by a lot of politicians. The former French Industry Minister Christian Estrosi accused the CEO of Renault-Nissan of “not keeping his commitments vis-à-vis the French national.” No. 2 in the National Front, Louis Aliot,spoke about a “scandal” resulting from “absolutely crazy system.”

  • PSA Peugeot Citroen plant in Morocco

    FRANCE, 2015/06/25 HM King Mohammed VI of Morocco chaired, on lat Friday in Rabat, the signing ceremony of an agreement between Morocco and French group PSA Peugeot Citroen providing for the setting up of an automobile factory in the integrated industrial platform "Atlantic Free Zone" in the region of Gharb Chrarda Bni Hssen. Next highlighting the positive results of the automobile industry as the initial exporting sector in Morocco in 2014, Minister for Industry, Trade, Investment and Digital Economy Moulay Hafid Elalamy said that the new plant reflects the trust that Morocco enjoys part leading car manufacturing groups.

  • Dangote Cement's 5000 Job Prospects Excites Government of Senegal

    NIGERIA, 2015/04/08 Leading Cement manufacturers, the Dangote Cement Plc has rolled out products from its $300 million cement plant in Senegal amid excitement by the country's government on the prospect of direct employment of about 5,000 thousands of the locals by the company. The establishment of the cement plant by Dangote is said to be the single major investment in Senegal by an African and the Senegalese government promised to protect the company to achieve its optimal production capacity. Both the Nigerian Ambassador to the Republic of Senegal, Katyen Jackden and Senegal Director of Mines, Ousmane Cisse commended the doggedness of the Chairman of Dangote Cement in seeing the plant through despite various setbacks.

  • Nigeria’s film industry steps out of the shadows

    NIGERIA, 2015/04/05 The contributions of Nigeria’s film industry, the second-major in the world in terms of number of films produced, to the national economy have become all the clearer next the rebasing of the country’s GDP last year. A move to recalculate the net worth of Nigeria’s economy in 2014 saw the number of industries or activities used for assessment purposes rise from 33 to 46, with a noticeable shift in emphasis towards technology-driven sectors. Part the segments included for the initial time were the film industry, the IT sector, the music industry, on-line sales and telecommunications. As a result of the rebasing exercise, Nigeria’s GDP in 2013 jumped from an initial estimate of $285.5bn to $510bn. The Nigerian film industry, known as Nollywood, is a key contributor to the increase. Under the rebasing conducted by the national statistics agency, the film industry accounted for additional than 1.4% of GDP – or $7.2bn of Nigeria’s economy. With an estimated 1m people due or not instantly working in the industry, the making, distributing and screening of moving pictures has become the country’s second-biggest source of employment next agriculture.
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