The Global Business Forum Africa (GBF Africa 2019) in Dubai concluded on November 19th with a call from African and UAE government and business leaders to bolster bilateral economic ties and capitalise on new business opportunities emerging across the continent.
More than 2,500 delegates from 76 countries attended the fifth edition of GBF Africa, including presidents of Liberia and Zimbabwe, the prime ministers of Mozambique and Uganda, as well as ministers, policymakers and prominent businessmen, who shared their insights on Africa’s evolving economic landscape.
A total of 350 bilateral business meetings were held on the sidelines of the two-day forum, marking a 75 percent increase compared to the previous edition. Sessions during the event covered a wide range of key issues and trends impacting African economies, including the shift towards regional integration following the launch of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), advanced technologies reshaping the government and business spheres and the role of startups and cross-border cooperation in driving the continent’s next phase of growth.
GBF Africa 2019 was organised by Dubai Chamber of Commerce and Industry under the theme Scale-Up Africa, building on its legacy as the most important event of its kind in the region which aims to nurture and expand UAE-Africa trade links.
Hamad Buamim, President & CEO of Dubai Chamber, said: “The fifth edition of GBF Africa exceeded our expectations and achieved its objectives, while the forum saw a 67 percent increase in attendance compared to the previous edition, reflecting growing confidence in Dubai as a preferred hub for African companies.”
He noted that Dubai Chamber is preparing to host the largest and most comprehensive GBF Africa to date at Expo 2020 Dubai, adding that the next edition of the forum will offer an ideal platform for African businesses to boost their global profile and explore new growth opportunities.
UAE has potential to double exports to Africa: analysis
There is tremendous potential for the UAE to double its exports to African countries with plastics, rubber and sugar identified as the top products offering the most untapped export potential estimated at $867.9 million, $457.9 million and $291.7 million, respectively.
The analysis, based on recent data from the International Trade Center (ITC), relies on an economic model using supply and demand data, along with ease of trade indicators to determine the untapped export potential for a selected exporting country in the chosen target market.
The UAE’s exports to African countries have recorded strong growth over the past decade, supported by a number of key trends and factors such as expanding UAE-Africa trade links, Dubai’s ongoing efforts to enhance its position as a gateway to African markets and improving economic conditions across the continent.
Top UAE exports to Africa
The findings indicate that the UAE’s exports of certain products, such as electrical devices, machinery, and vehicles, have exceeded their export potential to the African continent, which is an indicator of the development of trade links between UAE exporters and African markets. However, it points out that the UAE is still developing its “hub status” for the export of the majority of other products.
Top UAE exports to African markets in 2017 by value were plastics and rubber ($925.3 million) metal products ($407.7 million), other metal products ($267.8 million), sugar ($190.2 million), beauty products and perfumes ($165.7 million), and jewelry and precious metal articles ($161.7 million).
High-potential African markets
The top African markets offering the most untapped potential to import plastics and rubber products from the UAE include: Kenya (estimated untapped potential of $88.2 million), Egypt ($81.3 million), Nigeria ($73.3 million), Tanzania ($ 63.6 million) and Ethiopia ($35.5 million).
Somalia ($91.8 million), Sudan ($66.7 million), Libya ($49.8 million), Djibouti ($35.7 million) and Egypt ($29.3 million) were identified as high-potential African markets where the UAE can boost its exports of sugar.
In the category of metal products, the analysis suggested that UAE exports to Egypt could potentially be increased to $34 million), followed by Ethiopia ($26.6 million), Libya ($24.5 million), Angola ($23.6 million) and Senegal ($10.9 million).
Global Business Forum Africa 2019 concludes with call to bolster UAE-African economic ties
Berbera Ports targets 30pct of Ethiopian Cargo
Somaliland targets over 30 percent of Ethiopian container cargo as construction work for the first phase expansion of the port of Berbera progresses halfway. The Port Authority says expansion should be completed by October 2021.
Berbera Corridor is a comprehensive engagement between Somaliland and Ethiopia. It allows for sea access, roads, telecom infrastructure and electricity led by a joint coordination committee.
The first phase consists of building a 400-meter quay and 250,000-square meter yard extension. It was awarded to Shafa Al Nahda. The port expansion will cost 442 million USD.
“The expansion process is going well as we are closely following the project, which will be completed on time,” General Manager of Somaliland Port Authority Said Abudilahi told a group of journalists adding that the contractor is very experienced.
Shafa Al Nahda has been involved in the Port of Dakar expansion in Senegal as well as the Port of Maputo expansion project in Mozambique.
DP World holds a 51 percent stake in Berbera Port, while Ethiopia holds 19 percent and Somaliland the rest.
“A port without a road is nothing so we are working side by side and struggle to complete the Barbera corridor comprehensive scheme with a road, all the way from Barbara toTogochale. “The General Manager said expressing his strong dedication for the road connectivity.
Still another UAE and the Abu Dhabi Fund for Development Construction the company are also building a 250-kilometer divided highway between the city of Berbera and the Ethiopian border town of Togochale which should be finished in May 2021.
The joint coordination committee (JCC) was formed at the ministerial level to deal with trade engagements and legal aspects. As the expansion goes on, the trenching activity will begin after 10 days to reach the international level of port facilities.
They have added another facility as well and a tugboat was already purchased last year that can push 50 thousand tons and they are bidding to purchase another tugboat.
All this is a push to increase the Port’s capacity and make it competitive with regional ports. The standards will be international and Berbera will be a gateway serving 20 at least thousand vessels per year.
The expansion includes a dry port, free trade zone, and oil banker. In 2021 they are preparing a mother vessel from China, Singapore or the USA and soon will begin transmission shipments and finishing the road and port expansion,” the manager said.
As soon as the first expansion work is completed, the 2nd phase will begin with a 269 million USD investment to build a 400-meter expansion project increasing the total capacity to 800 container terminals.
Currently, the port serves as the humanitarian hub for east Africa and the World Food Program and they charge minimal fees. It is not used much by commercial vessels.
“Lack of communication, mixing up Somaliland and Mogadishu (Somalia) and the poor infrastructure make Ethiopians reluctant to use the port,” adds the manager.
To this end, the Port Authority plans to have a forum to market trading with Somaliland and Port Berbera as soon as the Berbera corridor is competed.
The Berbera corridor project should be finished by May.
Concerning the legal issues, a joint committee from Ethiopia and Somaliland are working together on the issues of customs, taxation and legal matters.
In 2016, A Dubai based shipping firm, (DP) World won a 30-year concession with an automatic 10 year extension for the management and development of a multi-purpose project at Berbera Somaliland.
Net & Com introduces new technological futures
NET & COM, Information and Technology Center introduce new technological features LMS (learning management system mElimu) a cloud based technology from India and Robot MEA (robot Middle East, Africa) South Korea products “Robotami” for creative education. As Mesfin Bekele Managing Director of net and com said “all these new features help developing a creative education system.”
Robotami is collection of educational robot kits with different series and varieties of robot product types for different levels. Robotami has coding session and STEAM classes compromising of four stages of basic intermediate, advanced and profound said Mesfin “It helps for abundant education by shaping the future of youth for an educational model that seeks to achieve creative convergence by combining science, technology, engineering, art and mathematics.”
mElimu is a SCORM compliant solution with in-built Asynchronous and Blended Learning Methodology, Learning method Applications and Admission Auto Application Approval/Rejection Student Profiling Selection Process on Boarding, Practice Quiz and Exercises with Feedback for instant gratification Assignments with Video Interactive Questions Submit Assignments, Periodic Reminders and Alerts for Assignments and Quizzes Get Video feedback from teachers on submitted assignments. mElimu is expected to addresses major obstacles in rolling out equitable learning opportunities efficiently and cost-effectively. mElimu has offline and online learning platform institutions learning system which overcomes the challenges of limited electricity, high-speed Internet, and hardware availability by leveraging multiple content dissemination channels, such as mobile, web, and tablet platforms.
By applying this system schools, universities, training centers, organizations would be beneficiary in terms of improving quality, by providing student centric education, save capital expenditures, utilizing the existing resources, rapid expansion in new geographies and new short courses, without capital investment increased student to teacher ratio with modern tools and supporting analytics save recurring expenses with improved staff efficiency save on wastages around the system due to lose controls increase revenue by attracting more self-sponsored. For students it can be one place to get all alerts and reminders, send audio and text messages, anti-plagiarism tools to help identify copied assignments, course level real-time analytics topic level and paragraph level analytics for timely intervention grade and send video feedback to students and value addition to teachers.
Net and Com usually works on software solutions, cyber security, data center and infrastructure.
UNCTAD 2019 Least Developed Countries
The United Nations conference on trade and development calls on the poorest countries to take a leading role in directing external loans and aid for their development. Developing Countries should take ownership of their development agenda and manage the allocation of external development finance in alignment with their national development priorities.
LDC criteria are reviewed every three years by the Committee for Development Policy (CDP) group of independent experts that reports to the UN Economic and Social Council. According to their per capital income, human asset and economic vulnerability, Currently 47 countries have been designed as least developed countries of the world, 32 from Africa’s, eight Asians and seven from Oceania countries.
As the report shows LDCs account for around 20 of the most aid-dependent countries due to persistent shortfalls in their domestic savings and per capita income. Except those who are oil-exporting countries, 50 percent of these countries have zero account capacity to general surplus and they are dependent on external resources for capital accumulation. As World Bank and international monetary fund debt sustainability framework In May 2019, five countries were in debt distress, 13 in high risk of debt, 17 moderate risks and nine were in low risk of debt. The report indicates that Ethiopia is at high risk of paying back its debt with zero account capacity. The country expansion of trade flows has largely failed to support the nation and commodity dependency. The resource gap remained about 15 percent of its GDP. In the latest report shows Ethiopia has 52 billion debts which are 26 billion of it is the external debt which covers 33percent of the GDP. Targeted aid less than 10 percent of it has reached the targeted area.
From the overall 23 percent of the gross disbursements of Ethiopia official development assistance flows in 2015- 2017 weight of aid for trade subcomponents Agriculture, forestry and fishing take the largest part followed by transport and tourism 6 percent, energy 4 percent, industry mining and construction 1.5 percent, business, and other services and trade policy and regulations 1 percent, banking, and finance 0.7 percent, communications 0.1 percent
Developing countries lose 100billion USD annually due to aggressive tax avoidance through the use of tax havens, tax envision and illicit finance flows are some obstacles to achieve sustainable and equitable growth. Reducing the illicit finance and arms flows, strengthening the recovery and export capacity, domestic and public resource mobilization, returns of stolen assets and combat all form of organized crimes is needed to strength there capacity. Developing countries should create a way to participate in private sectors on with national development priorities and the international community should revamp international development partnership and build up to aid management system. Aid flows relatively to economic variability’s has been on a steady decline since 2003.
Countries will typically need to qualify thresholds under at least two of the three criteria if the three year average per capital gross national income of the least developed countries has risen to the level of at least double and the performance is considered as sustainable the country will be eligible for the graduation from the list. Ethiopia has been listed as least developed countries for the last 40 years. And the government has planned to get out of the list until 2025 as middle-income countries.
LCDs have increased their debt more than doubling their external debt stock from 146 billion USD to 313 billion USD between 2007 and 2017.
