THE African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA) will succeed only if there is a huge appetite for infrastructure investment to drive industrialisation, technological developments and large-scale manufacturing.
This was among sentiments expressed by various speakers on Friday at the inaugural Africa Trade South Africa (ATSA) 2021 virtual conference.
The conference was aimed at exploring South Africa-Africa trade and investment opportunities in relation to the AfCFTA.
South Africa has historically been seen as an African powerhouse, and is poised to become a key player in the AfCFTA.
However, Africa’s infrastructure investment gap has widened over time, and the Covid-19 pandemic made things worse in 2020, in spite of high demand for projects and a sufficient supply of capital and investors.
According to law firm Baker McKenzie’s latest report, multilateral and bilateral lending into Africa has declined – with investment levels falling successively in 2019 and 2020 to $55 billion and $31bn,
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