Eco-Enviro News Africa AFSIC Feature
Natural resources rich Africa’s continuous growing economic competiveness within the context of a globalized economy, has for decades attracted and continues to attract international investor attention.
Africa’s Unique Selling Points
Aside accounting for over 60 percent of the world’s total arable land served with more than abundant surface and ground water resources,the continent also holds a huge proportion of the world’s natural resources, both renewables and non-renewables. In addition, the continent is home to some 30 percent of the world’s mineral reserves with particular reference to critical minerals needed for powering electric vehicles, eight per cent of the world’s natural Gas and 12 percent of the world’s oil reserves.
Africa’s population as a whole is very young, with 60% of the entire continent aged below 25, making it the youngest continent in the world, in relation to its population makeup. All of the world’s top 10 youngest countries by median age are in Africa and household incomes and consumption are projected to rise.
Share of World’s Fastest Growing Economies.
Africa has some of the fastest-growing economies in the world, African nations are playing an increasingly significant role in the global economy.
Africa’s pre-Covid-19 top five performing economies are projected to grow by more than 5.5% on average in 2023-2024 and to reclaim their position among the world’s 10 fastest-growing economies. These countries are Rwanda (7.9%), Côte d’Ivoire (7.1%), Benin (6.4%), Ethiopia (6.0%), and Tanzania (5.6%).
Returns On Investments
A report by the UN Conference on Trade and Development states that between 2006 and 2011, Africa had the highest rate of return on inflows of Foreign Direct Investment: 11.4%. This is compared to 9.1% in Asia, 8.9% in Latin America and the Caribbean
According ECA sources, the African continent could become the most profitable region in the world for foreign direct investment (FDI), with a rate of return of 14%, compared to a world average of 7.1%.
Some popular sectors for investment include primary agriculture and agro processing, mining, oil and gas, real estate, technology, tourism and hospitality and infrastructure. The mining industry in Africa is a major contributor to the continent’s economy, with abundant deposits of precious metals and minerals.
African policy makers believe FDI can help to provide technology, marketing and management skills, make up for domestic capital shortfalls, generate both efficiency and technology transfer in local firms, and facilitate access to foreign markets
The importance and relevance of Africa’s leading global Investment event, “Investing in Africa” could therefore be best appreciated against this background.
Scheduled to take place from the 8th-10 October,2023 in London, UK, the event seeks to draw over 1,500 delegates worldwide. In participation are thirty-two (32) African countries, thirty-six (36) other countries five hundred and ninety-nine (599) African delegates, six hundred and fifty-nine (659) delegates from other countries, three hundred and forty-one (341) Speakers and Chairs, twenty-seven (27) Media Partners, fifty-two (52) Sponsors and thirty-five (35) networking stands.
The Managing Director, Rupert McCammon in an interview earlier this year noted that, AFSIC now in its 10th year, is believed to be the largest African investment event taking place annually outside Africa and has become one of the most important conduits of investment into Africa.
Over the past ten years AFSIC, Mr. McCammon intimated, has been entirely focused on bringing together Africa’s business leaders and Africa’s most interesting investment opportunities with the continent’s most important investors and dealmakers to facilitate new investment into Africa.
Wide ranging support from exceptional partners and sponsors AFSIC, over the past ten years, he noted, has led the way in profiling investment opportunities from Africa and providing an excellent forum and associated platforms to showcase these opportunities to investors.
AFSIC is a conference that is very focused on networking and delegates attend year on year as they feel the variety of interactions and the superb content delivered all contribute to getting deals done and investment secured.
Networking Opportunities
Supported and sponsored by some of the leading Africa-focused corporates, AFSIC 2023 will build upon the last ten years’ successes.
The AFSIC 2023 networking opportunities include: matchmaking sessions facilitated through the sophisticated Event and Meeting App which goes live one month prior to the event ,a networking exhibition with key sponsors and partners offering enhanced opportunities to meet with them, numerous sessions dedicated to meeting a wide range of representatives from investor groups including: DFI’s, Impact Investors, Private Equity Investors and Venture Capital Investors, the regularly sold-out Meet African Dealmakers event – this year to be jointly sponsored by the European DFIS,country investment summits focused on the fastest growing African economies with informal networking at the end of each session ,various evening social functions hosted by our partners and sponsors
Speakers and Panel events
The event is broken down into Industry Streams and this year these will include Advancing Agriculture, Building Africa, Banking on Africa, Fintech Innovation, Power Africa, Sustaining Africa and Informed Investing in parallel to country-focused investment summits and quick-fire sessions highlighting exceptional projects.
Speakers are from a wide pool of exceptional African business leaders who are looking to promote their Africa-focused company from an investment perspective as well as some of the leading institutional investors and dealmakers focused on driving investment into Africa.
Sponsors and Partners
Africa Investment Advisor
Sahel Capital
Urban Shelter LTD
AFSIC 2023 welcomes British International Investment, FSD Africa, Executives in Africa, 27Four, Icecap, RMB, Fitch Ratings, Bank One, Alpha Morgan, Benchmark International, Pearlbridge Capital Managers, Mitco, Carey Olsen, Proparco, FMO, NIDP and DEG to date and negotiations are still ongoing with many other exceptional companies who see the value of the association with AFSIC in October and the all year round exposure via the digital platforms.
The event media and partners are also critical in raising the profile of both our sponsors and the conference itself.
Digital Presence and Reach
AFSIC has exceptional digital reach with a network of over 140 000 mailable contacts including institutional investors, investment bankers & financial intermediaries, African business leaders, providers and executives. The Group’s 3 websites capture 7,5 million impressions annually with impressive top 10 SEO ranking for over 1600 keywords relating to business, trade and investment in Africa. In addition, AFSIC 2023, like AFSIC 2022, will have all content recorded and live streamed enabling AFSIC to have an exceptional Pan-African reach.
AFSIC Digital platforms
AFSIC boasts two award-winning digital dashboards focused on matching business, trade and investments opportunities across all African countries and all business sectors.
The Africa Business Community provides a vast network of African businesses, global businesses, government agencies and service providers. In 2023 AFSIC is working closely with Prosper Africa, a US Government initiative, to substantially enhance US-Africa trade.
AFSIC’s sophisticated matching algorithm ranks and matches business opportunities and “calls for business” posted on our Africa Business Opportunities Dashboard, allowing interested parties to connect through this free and open access platform.
There is also a closed AFSIC African Investments Dashboard which is catered to matching institutional investors and African companies seeking capital with investor-ready documents.
Expected Traction from Business Opportunities Posts
In 2022 over 2 million personalised business matching emails were sent and AFSIC database sees 30 000 new contacts joining annually, all with an interest in business, trade and investment opportunities across Africa and all business sectors.
AFSIC African Investments Dashboard has a network of 25 000 investors. AFSIC’s recommendation is that, all business opportunity owners make their descriptions as detailed and clear as possible to appear attractive to interested parties and investors.
Business Opportunities Dashboard versus AFSIC African Investments Dashboard
The Africa Business Opportunities Dashboard offers free registration, access and connections for all users using automated matching algorithms and individually customised e-communication strategies. The AFSIC African Investments Dashboard is a closed dashboard only viewable by registered investors and uploads are only available for high quality projects seeking equity, debt or hybrid investment capital. We also offer additional bespoke introduction services for our AFSIC African Investments Dashboard clients.
Country Investment Summits and Networking Sessions
AFSIC 2023 will offer country investment summits for the larger economies in Africa and these sponsored comprehensive summits will comprise: •a panel discussion led by in-country experts sharing their insights on how to successfully navigate the investment ecosystem in each country, Quick fire Pitch Sessions on specific investment opportunities across business sectors in each country, informal business networking to meet some of the countries’ business leaders, government representatives and investors Angola Nigeria Rwanda Egypt Morocco country networking.
Informal country networking sessions at AFSIC 2023 will provide delegates with an opportunity to meet other interested investors and in-country experts to discuss the investment climate
Raising capital for your own fund?
AFSIC provides opportunities for fund executives to attract investment into new funds through introductions to Fund of Fund, DFI, SWF Investors can share their funds’ metrics, mandates and past performance through formal presentation sessions, investor panels, formal and informal networking sessions and B2B meetings supported by the AFSIC African Investments Dashboard digital database of investment opportunities and the sophisticated Event and Meeting App
