Africa: Former U.S. Export-Import Bank Chair Says Private Sector is Solution to Developing World Problems

18 March 2002
Corporate Council on Africa (Washington, DC)
press release

Monterrey, Mexico — In an address in Monterrey, Mexico to a United Nations conference on development, James Harmon, former chairman of the United States Export-Import Bank, called for the private sector to lead efforts to address the needs of the developing world. "The private sector is an essential part of the solution," stated Harmon, who lauded the potential of private sector-led trade and investment to lift the economies of developing countries.

"The private sector's ability to manage, to move quickly, to bring to bear immense resources, to be imaginative and entrepreneurial far outpaces even the finest government and multilateral institutions", Harmon added. He stopped short of advocating that trade replace traditional forms of aid.

The full text of Harmon's speech is available at www.africacncl.org Harmon, who now chairs the Corporate Council on Africa (CCA), delivered the remarks to an audience of world government and business leaders from more than 60 nations gathered for the UN International Conference on Financing for Development. The conference will examine ways to finance development in poor nations.

U.S. President George W. Bush, who is among the conference dignitaries, also recently pointed to liberalized trade as an engine for growth in the world's poorest countries. On March 14, Bush pledged $5 billion to developing countries willing to improve their economic and political institutions.

Harmon served from 1997-2001 as chairman of the United States Export-Import Bank. During his terms at the bank, American export credits for Africa rose from $50 million to nearly $1 billion. Before entering public service, he was chairman and CEO of Schroder Wertheim & Co., a global investment banking firm. He is CEO of Harmon & Co., a New York investment bank that advises companies engaged in the developing world.

CCA, established in 1992, is a nonprofit 501 (c) (3) organization of nearly 200 American companies dedicated to strengthening trade and investment ties between the United States and Africa. CCA members represent nearly 85 percent of total U.S. private sector investments in Africa.

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