Monday 25th March 2019 www.trendsnafrica.com a digital platform set up to promote Africa’s business interests across the world, including India has called for unprecedented Indian focus on the economic cooperation with the continent to take advantage of the groundswell of business opportunities in a mutually beneficial manner.
Underscoring the need for a more aggressive and focused approach by India against the backdrop of huge Chinese investments flowing into Africa and the recent overturns of the US and Russia, CEO and editor of the www.trendsnafrica.com, Sheila Sudhakaran said, “ in the coming few decades, the economic landscape of Africa would undergo a sea change, thanks to the growing oil wealth, its rich raw material base such a gold, bauxite, titanium, diamonds etc and intense efforts being done to increase agricultural productivity and production.”
India, Sheila said, should focus on low lying fruits, such as food processing, building supply chains, helping the continent to develop its digital infrastructure, education, healthcare, financial technology, supply of clean and safe water etc,. In investment heavy sectors like roads, highways, development of ports, railways etc, Chinese presence is already there in a big way and they are taking advantage of backward and forward linkages of such investments. “Some of the Indian companies have focused on these sectors but their exposure is far below the Chinese investments. For instance, China built roads and highways between Djibouti and Ethiopia, a land locked country to facilitate movement of goods destined to Ethiopia and other neighboring countries. This has also helped China to set up salt processing plants on the shores Lake Assal, a saline water mass, which is being exported world-wide,” she added.
Very soon, Sheila observed that Africa Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA) would evolve, to become the largest trading bloc in the world with 44 countries as its members. The other day, Ethiopian parliament has cleared the ratification to f be a part of the free trade, taking the total number of countries ratifying AfCFTA to 21. Very soon, it is hoped that sulking Nigeria and South Africa, which are refusing to join the bloc purportedly to protect their national economic interests, will come on line, taking the total number of countries to 44 with a population of over one billion. The objective of the grouping is to take the intra-trade to the vicinity of 52% by removing 90% trade barriers and to ensure free movement of people within the continent.
These developments would necessitate larger Indian presence in the continent. “India with its expertise and capabilities in micro, small and medium sectors can have many takers in Africa. For instance, in the special economic zone in Gabon, a small country, more than half of the investors in the SME sectors are either Indian businessmen or people of Indian origin. Across that small country, it is estimated that there are over 4000 businessmen from India engaged in various avocations like traders, investors etc. Across Africa, the number of Indians and people of Indian ethnicity are very large and India should take advantage of this,” Sheila added.
