AU Monitor

Will AU Summit Encourage Industrial Take-off?

(PANA) - Farming methods in Africa have not improved and many people are abandoning their ancestral land to move to the cities to look for jobs.

There may be new opportunities in urban centres but this is not a general rule around the continent, whose young people can no longer rely on old safety nets.

Factories and service enterprises in towns do not have the capacity to absorb all school-leavers and university graduates.

In its ‘World Economic Situation and Prospects 2008’ report, the UN has applauded Africa’s strong economic performance that began in 2003 and warned that, if the continent is to accelerate growth beyond the ongoing commodity boom, it should embark on economic diversification and productivity improvements in agriculture and industrial sectors.

Coming on the heels of this report is the 10th Ordinary Session of the Assembly of the African Union (AU), set for 31 January - 2 February 2008 in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa.

Africa’s industrial development is the main focus of this session that will also put in office a new team of commissioners to manage the secretariat of the AU and ensure implementation of the Summit decisions.

They will assume their charge calling to mind the Summit position on industrial development.

Over the past decades the world has seen Africa’s initiatives to accelerate its own industrial development falter for one reason or another, often with too many priorities taking precedence over this agenda.

With the exception of South Africa and Egypt, the other AU Member States have not yet developed a sizeable capital goods sector to support their own industrialization.

As the African leaders cause the hustle and bustle that usually accompany their gatherings, back home ordinary citizens will be glued to TV sets, radios and monitors in internet cafes eager to find out if the summit brings good tidings about their social, economic and human rights concerns.

Will industrial development come as a disguised way to dislocate the urban poor or increase air and waterfronts pollution? Will it mean more effluents being discharged into streams on which poor communities depend for water supply, irrigation of vegetable gardens and watering their livestock?

Many would expect that at this summit, African leaders rethink the continent’s approach to an industrial take-off that will make the difference, stop deforestation and the plunder of natural resources and keep Africa’s natural ennvironment livable for posterity.

A meaningful approach to Africa’s industrial development should not be a one-sided affair under the thumb of either foreign investors or the local rich.

Otherwise, it fails to catalyse overall development.

Besides the active participation of domestic companies, more and more of the local people need to be equipped with appropriate tools, skills and education so that they can play their part in an industrialisation process that will eventually pull their nations out of poverty.

Africa’s industrial development requires the pooling of human, technical and natural resources on a regional basis.

It’s not easy for one country to go it alone.

Despite their great desire for regional and continental integration, most of the African countries have little to gain from cross-border markets because their exports are largely the same primary commodities.

Today’s technological sophistication has definitely changed the landscape of industrial development and the location of foreign direct investment from what African planners and decision makers had in mind in the 1970s and 1980s.

Chances of benefiting from industrial ventures will be enhanced where governments undertake seriously their core functions such as providing basic education and public health care, fighting corruption and enforcing the rule of law.

In addition, government policies should enable local industrialists to have and keep up confidence in their business plans and technologies.

The more they stick to production the more they will take business seriously and stay assured about prospects for the market—an essential element for growth.

Without ruling out the possibility of some inventions originating from Africa, indigenous initiatives will need to seek affiliates abroad either as shareholding partners or as suppliers of components in the emerging global production networks.

On this account, AU leaders should go all-out to eliminate red tapes in domestic institutions, make sure that serious investors turn up, and that transnational corporations undertaking mining or any extractive activities in Africa foster the development of manufacturing enterprises on the continent.

Africa cannot afford to see yet another opportunity bungled by its policy makers and planners of industrial development.

National policies must eliminate loopholes that swindlers usually take advantage of to deepen the poverty of poor countries.

The Summit will be deemed a success if it comes out with a winning strategy to encourage continuous investment in Africa’s manufacturing sector.

But, the strategy should at the same time spell out the need for governments to increase complementary investments in transport and communication as well as power supply to allow manufactured goods to reach the markets.

Posted by on 01/15 at 02:28 PM

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