Business
Investing in Africa: Opportunities and risks abound
As a continent, Africa is of course diverse, with individual countries performing economically with different levels of success. There are however significant business opportunities across the continent, driven by an insatiable demand for Africa’s resources, a rapidly growing population with an unprecedented rise in consumer demand and the related infrastructural development that is urgently required in all areas.
Globally, business is recognizing Africa as a high growth region of enormous investment potential. There are two mega-trends shaping ‘investment hungry’ Africa: the limitless global demand placed on Africa’s abundant resources and the consumer-based demand within Africa resulting from the rapidly growing ‘one billion plus’ population.
While the animal migration patterns in Africa have been established over countless years, there is a new ‘Great Migration’ that has suddenly taken hold – that of big business and new investment. The parallels are obvious – a sense of urgency, the frenzy, preying on the weak and feeble, following the pack, a search for ‘greener pastures’ (new opportunities), ‘no going back’, those who don’t know will need to look to those who do know to help them, etc.
The great Africa business migration, into and across Africa by investors in search of ‘greener pastures’, is therefore defined by:
Opportunity– the last great frontier for attractive investment
A sense of common purpose and urgency
Challenges and potential danger, especially recognising the complexities of doing business in any number of the 55 very different countries that make up what is collectively Africa
Strategy and Execution – i.e., actually making it happen: safely, profitably and sustain-ably.
The reality is that the ‘Great Africa business migration’ has begun, whether by existing players moving into new markets across Africa or by new entrants in search of resources to fuel their own growth. The question on every investor’s mind is how to take advantage of the Africa opportunity – confidently, comprehensively and on time.
