African political and business leaders gathered in Ghana’s capital Accra on Thursday for a summit on the continent’s prosperity agenda.
Dubbed the “Africa Prosperity Dialogue Series” participants have been discussing how Africa can achieve deeper economic integration between different states.
Ghana is the host nation of the AfCFTA (The African Continental Free Trade Area) Secretariat, which is spearheading an agenda of reducing trade barriers on the continent.
The vice president of Ghana, Dr. Mahamadu Bawumia who spoke at the start of the summit said the continent must get serious in reducing poverty through what he called “smart investments.”
“As a continent, we need to produce and trade our way out of poverty and underdevelopment, and we cannot do that without investing in smart infrastructure across the continent,” he said.
According to him much has been achieved in the past decades but the volume of work left to be done is enormous.
“There is the need for additional resources to finance the arteries for trade, which include the physical infrastructure such as roads, rail and energy, digital infrastructure such as data centres and financial infrastructure to allow for integration of our financial markets,” Bawumia said.
Challenges present opportunities for success
The secretary-general of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), Wamkele Mene also told the gathering that Africa must make use of the opportunities its challenges to develop.
“We have an opportunity as Africans [to tell] a positive narrative about the challenges that we confront. Indeed, I believe that Africa’s challenges are Africa’s opportunities,” he said.
The maiden series of the Africa Prosperity Dialogues kicked off on Thursday (26 January) and will end on Saturday (28 January).
Africa Prosperity Network, the organisers of “The Africa Prosperity Dialogues” the summit also dubbed the Kwahu Summit helps to enhance intra-African trade and the elevate Africa into prosperity.
The Dialogues are being supported by the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) Secretariat and the Presidency of Ghana.
The summit ends on Saturday, 28 January, where the political and business leaders are to engage in a presidential and business executives’ dialogues.
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Source: Africafeeds.com
