CALL FOR DISCUSSION ON THE GREEN ECONOMY IN AFRICA

This Call for Discussion is directed to all Chairs, Speakers, Moderators, Panellists, Delegates, Organisers and other Participants in this year’s Africa summits, conferences, meetings and decision-making forums. The record number of events focused on Africa in 2013 proves beyond doubt that the continent is at last moving into a position of influence in global affairs (1). In a crisis-ridden and faltering global economy Africa is seen as the new engine of economic growth. Put together, the participants in this year’s events represent the greatest gathering of ‘Afro-optimists’ ever assembled, discussing a wide range of subjects whose outcomes will influence how the next chapter of Africa’s growth story unfolds. Each meeting, unique in its composition, holds a key to Africa’s future.

However, while optimism in Africa has reached spectacular heights in recent years, there is enough evidence to suggest that caution is needed at all levels of discussion. This is Africa’s third era of hope and while this time is certainly different, so much unfortunately is still the same. Business-as-usual, or the old ‘brown’ economy, which has failed Africa so dramatically in the past, is still the most dominant force on the continent and is expanding fast. Yet sustainability as a means to address the externalities or ‘hidden costs’ of business-as-usual in Africa is given very little space in most of this year’s meetings. The green economy, which African leaders increasingly recognise as the only viable route to achieving sustainability and resilience, is not even mentioned on most agendas. Climate change, the biggest hidden cost of the brown economy and one which threatens Africa more than any other, is also absent from most Africa meetings in 2013.

This could be a pivotal year for Africa, the last frontier for investment. This, therefore, is a call for the green economy to be included in all discussions on Africa’s potential and Africa’s future. In the last 20 years African countries have made huge progress in green development and are in a unique position to take the lead in the evolving global green economy. The UN’s Rio+20 ‘Earth Summit’ in June 2012 confirmed that the green economy is not a luxury but a 21st century imperative. Africa’s Consensus Statement to Rio+20 made it clear that the continent is ready for a rapid expansion of the green economy we all must eventually build. Leading Africans from Meles Zenawi, late prime minister of Ethiopia, to Kofi Annan, former UN secretary-general and Donald Kaberuka, president of the African Development Bank, have been telling us for years that green growth is critical to Africa’s future. This year’s meetings on Africa are the most important forums to explore ways forward.

Possible areas for discussion as a way of understanding the green economy in Africa are: (1) the history of industrial development on the continent from 1950-1990 which will show how the hidden costs of the high carbon, resource intensive, ecologically degrading and social divisive brown economy caused failures in the past and will cause failures in the future; (2) the history of green development and the evolution of the green economy in Africa, from the Lem Meeting in Addis Ababa in June 1992 (held in conjunction with the UN’s first Rio Summit) to Rio+20 in June 2012, and (3) how Africa’s green economies can be measured, developed and expanded to meet the world’s urgent need for green growth as the only long-term way to rebalance the global economy and save the planet. Africa’s under-developed brown economies are now Africa’s greatest advantage for building a green economy.

This Call for Discussion urges readers to forward the message to anyone who might be participating in or might influence, in whatever capacity, any of this year’s Africa events. If you would like to comment or share any relevant contacts please send an e-mail to greenexplorersafrica@gmail.com.  This call follows and supports an earlier Call to Action to Put the Green Economy into Africa’s Growth Story.

Thank you for your attention.



(1) PRELIMINARY LIST OF AFRICA-FOCUSED OR AFRICA-RELATED CONFERENCES IN 2013. THIS WILL BE ADDED TO AS MORE ARE DISCOVERED. IT IS WORTH NOTING AGAIN THAT, WITH FEW EXCEPTIONS, SUSTAINABILITY, THE GREEN ECONOMY, ADAPTATION AND CLIMATE CHANGE DO NOT FEATURE IN THE FOLLOWING AFRICA MEETINGS.

JANUARY

- 20^th African Union Summit - PanAfricanism and African Renaissance - Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

FEBRUARY

- 20^th Annual Investing in African Mining Indaba – Cape Town, South Africa

- Economist Africa Summit – Africa Unchained: the Next Generation – London, UK

- 15^th Annual Africa Business Conference, Harvard Business School – Redefining Africa: the Emergence of a New Africa Story - Allston, MA, USA

- Nigeria Oil & Gas Conference and Exhibition – Abuja, Nigeria

- Economist Conferences – Healthcare in Africa – Cape Town, South Africa

MARCH

- BRICS SUMMIT (brics5.co.za) - BRICS and AFRICA: Partnership for Development, Integration and Industrialisation - 

- Crans Montana Forum, 7^th Annual Africa Session – Africa in 2013, Upheavals and Changes – Brussels, Belgium

- Ernst & Young Strategic Growth Forum - Cape Town, South Africa

- 1^st Mozambique Gas Summit – Maputo, Mozambique

- African Refiners Association Week – Cape Town, South Africa

- World Investment Conference North Africa - Marrakech, Morocco

- Offshore West Africa (offshorewestafrica.com) - Deepwater Discoveries, Emerging Opportunities - Accra, Ghana

APRIL

-  OECD Global Forum on Development (oecd.org) - Paris, France

- African Venture Capital Association Conference (avcanet.com) - Cape Town, South Africa

- Liberia Mining, Energy & Petroleum Conference (limep.com) - Cape Town, South Africa

MAY

- Africa Global Business Forum – Bridging the Continent to the World – Dubai, UAE

- 3^rd Annual Oxford Pan-African Conference - Towards a 21st Century African Renaissance: Sowing the Seeds of Success – Oxford, UK

- 23^rd World Economic Forum on Africa – Delivering on Africa’s Promise – Cape Town, South Africa

- 1^st Youth Investment Summit – The Road to Economic Growth – Accra, Ghana

- Careers in Africa - International Recruitment Summit – London, UK

- 21^st AU Summit – 50^th Anniversary of the African Union – Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

- AFDB Annual Meetings – Africa’s Structural Transformation – Marrakech, Morocco

 

JUNE


JULY


AUGUST


SEPTEMBER


OCTOBER 


NOVEMBER

DECEMBER

SALIVATING INVESORS BEWARE

INVESTORS NEED FRESH MODELS OF AFRICAN GROWTH

A LETTER TO THE FINANCIAL TIMES (PUBLISHED)

Every Monday the Financial Times publishes a book review. The books chosen usually cover important and controversial issues of the day. On February 25, the title of the review by Andrew Jack was: Africa counts the cost of miscalculations, with the sub-heading: A tendency to issue doubtful data is rooted in colonial days and still creates problems for the continent, according to an important study. On a cautionary note the review begins with “There are lies, damned lies and then there are African statistics.” Read more.... (1)

The important study (the book reviewed) is Poor Numbers – How We Are Misled by African Development Statistics and What to Do about It, by Morten Jerven, an economics historian specialising in Africa. On the controversial question of whether Africa is rising or not, such is the inaccuracy of Africa’s development statistics that Professor Jerven has written elsewhere, "We have no idea". World Bank chief economist, Shantayanan Devarajan, has added to the confusion by talking of "Africa's statistical tragedy".

Measurements, calculations and statistics, and the way they are presented, are fundamental for gauging the levels of economic development. Nowhere is this more important today than in Africa, the least developed but fastest growing continent on which the future of the global economy depends.

The focus of the FT review was on the accuracy of statistical reporting and while this is critical it left many questions unanswered. The gaps prompted me to write the following Letter to the Editor of the FT (2) which was published on March 3 under the title: 

INVESTORS NEED FRESH MODELS OF AFRICAN GROWTH

Sir, Your Monday book reviews always capture the spirit of the day (“Consequences of a continent’s miscalculations”, February 25). The review of Poor Numbers – How We Are Misled by African Development Statistics and What to Do about It could not have a come at a better time. 2013 could be a record year for investment in Africa and, if these investments are to deliver the sustainable growth Africa and the global economy needs, the accuracy of measurements, calculations and statistics is crucial. But just as important as accuracy is content. The systems inherited by Africans at independence, and which still dominate the continent today, are hopelessly inadequate for a correct understanding of sustainability in Africa’s harsh and unpredictable conditions.

The post-colonial mini-booms of the 1970s and 1980s, fuelled by recycled petrodollars and deregulated funds, soon turned into busts because investors had neither the knowledge nor the tools to measure the externalities, or hidden costs, of doing business in the world’s most challenging continent. Gross domestic product as the primary accounting system of the post-colonial model, for example, told us nothing about sustainability.

With the effects of climate change accelerating, populations exploding, inequality escalating, the environment rapidly degrading and biodiversity disappearing all over the continent, investments will have to be very carefully placed otherwise “Africa’s moment” might be just that – Mali's looks like it has already been and gone. Many more could follow if the hundreds of billions of dollars pouring into Africa are not allocated using new measurements, new calculations and new statistics applied by new professions for the 21st century.

Although “this time is different” in Africa, unfortunately so much is still the same. Despite significant progress on green development over the past 20 years, the old unsustainable “brown” economy is still the most powerful force on the continent. Furthermore, the hidden costs today are far higher than 30 years ago, while so much more is at stake. If Africa is to be the new engine of global growth, it will have to be measured in new ways based on some sort of Green GDP, or GDP-plus, designed by Africans with responsible partners. The good news is that African governments with the UN, World Bank and other global institutions are moving in this direction.

Your sister newspaper, The Economist, reports this week that “Global investors are salivating over Africa.” Without new and accurate statistics there is a great danger that many will bite off more than they can chew. The colonials made lots of mistakes but they were right about one thing: “In Africa things are not always as they seem.” Salivating investors beware.

END

On March 10 a response to this was published as a letter in the FT: Africa is on the rise - come and see for yourselves (1) by Dr Mthuli Ncube, Chief Economist and Vice President, African Development Bank, Tunis, Tunisia.

Related letters to the FT (1):

Now is the moment to rethink Ethiopia - August 28, 2012
Green investment in Africa is in the interest of us all - July 1, 2012
An African green deal, phase two - April 16, 2012
Europe's role in unlocking Africa's green economy - March 9, 2012
 

(1) FT copyright rules do not allow the reproduction of material. The paper does, however, allow readers free access to 8 pieces a month for those wishing to locate the review and letters noted above.

(2) The copyright of Letters to the Editor are owned by the writer and mine is therefore legitimately presented here.