The two-day Compact with Africa Dialogue, launched in 2017 by Germany is a forum for attracting investment into the continent. Inaugurating the event German Chancellor Angel Merkel said she was “convinced” that boosting private investment from Germany would help the African continent to achieve an upturn in economic development. At the same time, she confessed that she has not visited even half of the 54 –nations in the continent. Merkel underscored investment would be a “stabilizing factor” for employment and energy supply across Africa.
German Development Minister Gerd Müller told that the German firms would be encouraged to make key investments in Africa. Toward this, the German government is planning to sign partnerships with Morocco, Tunisia and Ethiopia in addition to the existing arrangements with Ivory Coast, Senegal and Ghana. He also said that Germany has committed a development fund worth €1 billion (US$1.1 billion) a year ago and the investments were channelized to different countries. However, he conceded that the French and British firms’ investments in the continent are several times more than that. The tardiness in channelizing investments into Africa is mainly due to lackadaisical approach of the conservative German banks to give credit due to risk factors. While countries like France, China and India encourage their banking systems to give adequate exposure to entrepreneurs for investing in the continent, German banks are shying away from that.
