April 16-30, 2018
World Bank’s Africa’s Pulse biennial analysis of the economic outlook of African economies is on the expected lines. A moderate growth projected – from 2.6% in 2017 to 3.1% for fiscal 2018 – riding on the back of better economic performance by Nigeria, South Africa and Angola, triggered by expectations of steady oil and commodity prices, is achievable. The prognosticated annual growth of 3.6% for 2019-20 is dependent on the same assumptions that might have gone into the growth predictions for 2018-19-remunerative prices for oil and commodities. Any slippage in growth in fiscal 2018 would pull down the growth prospects for fiscal 2019. Going by the present uncertainty in global trade and the likely additional oil production by OPEC, US and other oil producing countries, the growth target may go for a toss.
Economic advancement of a region or for that matter a country should not be measured in vectors and numbers. Such numbers sometimes can camouflage the reality. There are many countries in the large continent that are bereft of basic needs, even compared to standards set for advanced African countries or for that matter their poor counterparts in South Asia or Latin America. Years of neglect, preponderance of poverty, lack of educational facilities, poor healthcare etc have been bane of Africa. The region should come out of that vicious cycle.
This cannot happen in a vacuum. Surge in oil prices can help some of the oil-rich countries. Not all countries can boast of the same degree resource base to benefit from the positive movement of commodity prices. Distribution of agricultural land and their fertility levels vary from one country to the other. There are countries, which lack rudimentary infrastructure for education and healthcare. The challenges for the African Union and multilateral organizations like World Bank, IMF, FAO, UNIDO etc should be to intensely map each country in the region and work out packages suitable for each country sensitive to the needs and resource base. For instance, a country like Ivory Coast needs more of processing units to convert their resource base into better value-added ones. A country like Kenya can develop its potentials for small and medium enterprises, tourism etc. It may be worthwhile for island countries like Madagascar, Mauritius and Seychelles to develop their services sectors like banking and finance, tourism, ICT and also to develop into educational hubs for catering to students from other countries including from Africa.
That will hold key to poverty reduction, employment generation, optimal usage of natural resources and more importantly for the inclusive and balanced growth of the entire region. Challenges are, indeed, very high and the way forward needs a lot of planning, and above all, meticulous execution.
