Africa urged to identify quality growth models for competitiveness
Ghana’s Trade and Industry Minister Mr Haruna Iddrisu, has urged African leaders to identify quality-growth models that can help increase competitiveness, enhance employment and reduce poverty.
He said Africa’s growing population and large consumer base was becoming an attractive market for regional and global companies and the continent needed to tap into the changing global landscape for economic growth.
Mr Iddrisu said this at ongoing 14th Annual International Academy of African Business and Development Conference in Accra which is being hosted by the Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration (GIMPA).
The conference is on the theme: “Integrating African Markets and Economies in a Changing Global Economy: Issues, Challenges and Opportunities”.
The Minister said the event was taking place at a time when most African countries had over the last decade succeeded in getting the fundamentals of economic management right, including a reduction in the debt burden, control of inflation and sustainable fiscal policies.
Mr Iddrisu said in its Economic Outlook for 2012, the International Monetary Fund had predicted average global growth rate for 2013 to be weak around 3.5 per cent with advanced economies growing at an average rate of 1.4 per cent.
He said a number of analysts had advocated integration into global value chains as a means of boosting African economies.
Mr Iddrisu said studies conducted by the Economic Commission for Africa had found out that the removal of existing trade barriers and tariffs among the countries on the continent would boost intra-African trade from 11 per cent to 22 per cent.
He said ECA statistics showed that intra-African trade had grown from 12.5 per cent in 2011 to 13 per cent in 2012 and said African governments needed to work with the private sector and civil society to improve intra-African trade.
In this direction, he urged African governments to address infrastructure constraints and bottlenecks, encourage local skills and technological capabilities development, negotiate regional trade arrangements and foster intra-African trade to become a global economic power to address employment and poverty.
Dr Chris I. Enyinda, President of IAABD, said the conference was a great source of publishing opportunities for academic and policy-oriented research in its premier journal of African Business.
He said IAABD, a member-oriented African business and development conference, aims for continuous scholarship quality, value creation and value preservation.
Dr Samuel Nii Noi-Ashong, Deputy Rector of GIMPA, said the Institute was happy to host the conference, which membership is opened to scholars, professionals, and graduate students of any nationality interested in research and performance of business and economic development issues in Africa.
He said the conference aims to also facilitate multidisciplinary research on Africa’s related issues and stimulate collaborations between Africa based researchers and their counterparts around the world.
The conference, which started on May 14, will end on Saturday May 18.
Source: GNA