Niamey — Further to the sixth African Union Conference of Ministers of Economy and Finance and Conference of African Ministers of Finance, Planning and Economic Development of the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), the launch of yearly Economic Report on Africa (ERA) 2013, will be organized by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa Sub-Regional Office for West Africa (ECA/SRO-WA) in collaboration with Niger's Ministry of Planning, Lands and Community Development (MP/AT/DC), on Monday the 24 of June 2013, in Niamey (Niger).
The Report is focused on the theme: Making the Most of Africa's Commodities: Industrializing for Growth, Jobs and Economic transformation. The discussions will be centered on vision, industrialization perspectives and structural transformation of Africa's economies. After critical analysis of the report participants will exchanges views on industrialization and Economical transformation of Africa.
According to the report, each African country should design industrial policy within the national development planning framework and, create the appropriate institutional and industrial policy mechanisms to increase effectiveness and competitiveness. African governments need to respond strategically, working closely with other stakeholders, through formulating and implementing required industrial policy.
These policies should be implemented in order to make the continent emerge as a global economic power able to address the challenges of youth unemployment, the poverty and gender inequality according to the 2013 economic report on Africa. But "maximizing Africa's commodities for industrialization involves adding value to soft and hard commodities and developing forward and backward linkages to the commodity sector," says the report.
Apart from providing employment, income, price and non-price benefits, African countries, by adding value to their raw materials locally, could also bring about diversification of technological capabilities, an expanded skills base, and deepening of individual countries' industrial structures, the document reveals.
In West Africa, economic performance moderated to 6.3 per cent in 2012 from 6.5 per cent in 2011. Nigeria, the continent's second-largest economy, slowed to 6.4 per cent from 7.4 per cent, reflecting receding fiscal stimulus and slowing oil investments on security concerns across the Niger Delta. Ghana's economy, after a sharp increase in 2011, slowed from 15.1 per cent in 2011 to a more realistic 7.4 per cent in 2012 with the slowdown of commercial oil production.
Political instability in Guinea-Bissau and Mali affected subregional growth, and both countries saw growth decline, but this was balanced by growth in Sierra Leone of 18.2 per cent owing to the exploitation of new mines and quarries deposits. Côte d'Ivoire posted 8.6 per cent post-conflict growth with a return to normal harvests. A growing pace of the extractive industry in oil supported Niger's 11.6 per cent expansion.
While some African countries have made modest progress in forward and backward linkages to their commodity sectors, others still have some ground to cover, according to the report, adding that interventionist state policies and continental initiatives could help improve the situation.
To further boost current levels of linkages, the report calls for urgent moves to reduce the infrastructural constraints and bottlenecks on the continent.
It also recommends improved policy implementation through coordination among relevant ministries in order to reduce incidents of coordination failure that have for long plagued the continent.
