Telling Africa's Growth Story Part 3
THE BETTER GOVERNANCE PARADIGM
THE BETTER GOVERNANCE PARADIGM
Last but not least, is the Better Governance Paradigm, the third core pillar of Africa’s growth. Better Governance covers to the capacity to plan and deliver specific polices and projects in a time-bound manner, as well as track, measure and improve them on a continuous basis. It has become a paradigm because African nations have made it their guiding principle to set their development goals and achieve them.
The preferred tool to anchor the Better Governance paradigm have been the National Development Plans (NDPs) which have now become almost universal with African governments. Examples of this trend include:
-the Plan for Emerging Senegal (PES),
-the GTPII in Ethiopia,
Morocco’s New Development Model, or
African National Development Plans (NDPs)
First, they are expansive and comprehensive: they cover the time span of one full phase of economic transformation, generally between seven to 15 years; they’re then subdivided into shorter plans of separate and consecutive stages/goals (or targets), generally of three to five years. Both the long and short term plans include detailed sectoral sub-plans to roll out new infrastructure and policy objectives for each priority sector: health, education, power, transport, clean water, broadband connectivity, as well as for specific high-impact projects.
Among many examples of the former are Rwanda’s ICT strategy (NICI), Kenya’s Fertilizer Cost Reduction Strategy, Senegal’s Zero slum program (PROZEBID), Morocco’s National Initiative for Human Development (INDH).
Ethiopia’s GERD, Diamniadio City in Senegal, Mozambique’s Coral Sul gas project, or the more than ten Olympic omnisport stadiums built in Cameroon for CAN2021 are examples of the latter.
The NDPs are commonly drafted in close consultation with a wide range of domestic stakeholders: private sector SMEs and large corporations, farmers, unions, government bureaucracies and NGOs, among others; so as to maximize the local buy-in and impact. In some cases, the Bretton Woods twins (IMF and World Bank) also provide input and even help design the plans.
One or several specialized central bodies are then charged with oversight and steering, such as the National Planning Authority (NPA) in Uganda, the Rwanda Development Board (RDB) and NIRDA, or in Senegal the Strategic Orientation Committee (SOC) under the President and the Steering Committee (SC) under the Prime Minister.
Clear macro-economic objectives to be reached over a definite period are another common feature of the African NDP policy mix, with clear intermediate deadlines as connectivity networks enable economic activity. The objectives mostly involve specific targets for GDP growth rates at the national and sectoral levels annually and for three to five years. Poverty reduction targets are generally included too, with specific reduction rates attached to each forecasted GDP growth rate.
Macro-economic stability and the rise of the African developmental states
A last recurring feature of NDPs in Africa are the econometric plans which forecast, measure and adjust the overall financing needs and the resulting impact in terms of government debt interest expense, budget deficits or national debt. These are sometimes combined with specific laws to limit how much debt or deficits the government can incur.
The fact that African countries have experienced no sovereign defaults over 2000-2020, in spite of the 2008 global meltdown and the 2014 oil and commodities crunch (with prices down 80%) is direct evidence of the continued increase in the quality of African financial management. It took the C19 pandemic, a once in a century global crisis, to cause one African country to default in 2020, Zambia; and the other African defaults are due to highly specific circumstances (sanctions amidst jihadist insurgency for Mali, and a mix of electoral politics and Bretton Woods influence for Ghana).
More importantly, the fact that the C19 crisis resulted only in a short-lived recession at the continental level, with most African countries experiencing slower but still positive growth, is not only testament to the augmented quality of economic management across the continent. The continent’s new norm of macro-economic management also demonstrates spectacularly the birth of the African developmental states. The African developmental states are each organized along their own national developmental strategy and each has its own independent relationships with foreign partners, but they also act in increasing coordination and continuous dialogue collectively. The continuing recovery across the board, in spite of the impact of the war in Ukraine, is only the latest item demonstrating how the Better Governance paradigm has become the foundation for the African developmental states.
CONCLUSION: WHAT WILL DRIVE AFRICA’S GROWTH IN THE FUTURE?
Once the drivers of African growth have been clearly identified, the question for potential partners and investors is: which industries and companies will drive Africa’s economic transformation going toward a US$20tn GDP in 2035 and more beyond?
Will Africa’s automobile industry lead manufacturing in its biggest economies and catalyze industrialization throughout the continent?
The consolidation of South Africa and Morocco as global automotive hubs thanks to international investments on one hand, and on the other, the emerging auto-industries in Ghana, Nigeria, Cameroon, Angola, Namibia, Ethiopia, Uganda and Rwanda, both indicate that a long boom in African automobile production, exports and domestic market consumption is gathering.
Or maybe Africa’s Digital Economy will take that lead?
With the addition of 500 million African users of smartphones and IoT devices, enabled by data connectivity infrastructure, the market to materialize may not be at the US$300bn as forecasted by McKinsey but rather in the trillions of USD.
Could it be the commodities and natural resources sectors against all odds?
With African nations finally succeeding in localizing on the continent the technologies and skills for the extraction, processing, refining, storage, export and last mile distribution and other higher value adding functions in the global supply chains for oil and gas, copper, iron as well as for the newly prominent lithium, cobalt, green hydrogen, LNG and others? To service the major global markets as well as African nations themselves?
Or perhaps Agriculture?
Will it be the agriculture and global food supply value chains that Africa successfully localize by radically optimizing the productivity of the continent’s agriculture technologically, financially and distribution wise? The result would be Africa becoming the favored supplier for a broad range of food items sought by consumers in the major global markets, especially by the middle classes of Emerging Asia.
Will Big Data transform Africa?
Will the tools of Big Data, such as AI, machine-learning, digital technologies, e-finance, e-learning, e-administration, smart logistics and smart industry, be leveraged in a holistic approach to manage not just one smart city anymore but each one of the continent’s 55 national economies?
The management through Big Data models spearheaded by Mustapha ‘TAF’ Njie in the TAF Cities and by Julius Mwale in MMTC clearly show the potential to decuple African growth and accomplishments at speeds previously unimaginable when applied holistically at the national, sub-regional and continental levels.
Or perhaps the emergence of African megacities will decide it all?
Will the rise of West Africa’s megalopolis unleash a tidal wave of productivity and efficiency powered by a population slated to reach 500 million and the integration of development infrastructure in the coastal metropolises of five countries from Lagos to Abidjan? As this megalopolis model becomes successful, it can be quickly replicated in the Gulf of Guinee (Kribi-Douala-Malabo-Libreville-Pointe-Noire-Kinshasa), in the Great Lakes region (Kampala-Kigali-Goma-Bujumbura-Lamu), in the Horn of Africa (Asmara-Addis-Ababa-Djibouti-Mogadiscio) and on the southern cone (Nairobi-Dodoma-Lusaka) and in other transnational trade corridors, thus unleashing a wave of growth that will dominate global markets.
All of the above growth trajectories are possible, and in reality African nations will each materialize a version of one or several of these scenarii, because the influence of the three core pillars of African growth ,Connectivity, Technology Appropriation and the Better Governance Paradigm, will affect each one of them differently . Which makes the next chapters of Africa’s growth story not just fascinating to discover but also highly rewarding for all those who know how to join in writing and telling it.