Africa must grow its manufacturing sector

At a press briefing in Midrand on Tuesday, United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO) Director-General Dr Kandeh Yumkella told journalists that in order for Africa to effectively tackle entrenched poverty and job scarcity, the continent needed to industrialise itself.

The DG was speaking at a press briefing in the midst of the first Extraordinary Session of African Union (AU) Conference of Ministers of Industry (CAMI).

The conference brings together African Minister of Industry, senior industry officials, Regional Economic Communities (REC's), partner organisations, and AU and UNIDO officials.

Dr Yumkella highlighted that some African economies are growing at between 3 and 5% as a result of the current global commodity boom.

“One of the questions African countries should be asking themselves is how do we use the returns from this commodity boom to diversify our economies?

“If we are going to deal with the issue of unemployment we must diversify our economies,” he said.

Africa is currently treating commodities such as oil and gas in the same way it treated other produce such as cocoa decades back he said.

“We are not looking at down stream results such as what will our energy needs be in 10 or 20 years, and how will we be able to power the continent which is expected to grow to 1.5 billion in the coming years,” noted Dr Yumkella.

Part of the problem, he said, was Africa's inability to date, to convert its abundant raw materials into finished products.

Africa needs to urgently enhance its efforts to add value to its raw materials in order to enhance competitiveness in the global economy he said.

Critical to the success of creating a solid and tangible framework that will provide end results is a strong political will amongst African countries.

In preparation of the summit currently underway, several studies entrusted to different African consultants and Expert Group Meetings organised jointly by the AU and UNIDO, concluded that the industrial development strategy of Africa should be based on the processing of its key natural resources.

The strategy would need to focus on shifting the continent from resource-based economies towards manufacturing-based economies through the industrial transformation of these natural resources in order to benefit from rapid economic growth and development.

The AU conference will focus on getting African Ministers of Industry and partner organisations to collectively contribute to the creation of a Comprehensive Action Plan that will lead to Africa industrial development.

Article published courtesy of BuaNews