The Group of 20 meeting of finance ministers and central bank governors in Baden-Baden, Germany, was a “first step” to kick start private investment in Africa, Moroccan Finance Minister Mohamed Boussaid said.
“This new initiative is completing and accelerating the visibility the continent will have on the worldwide private sector,” Boussaid said in an interview on Saturday. The finance ministries of the G-20 will support partnerships that for the first time will focus on promoting private investment, he said.
Germany, the European Union’s largest economy, started a program called “Compact with Africa” as part of its presidency of the G-20 to build up the continent’s economies and stem migration to the bloc, which has attracted more than 1 million refugees since 2015. Talks on so-called investment partnerships have started with the Ivory Coast, Morocco, Rwanda, Senegal and Tunisia, according to the German Finance Ministry.
The initiative started with the most dynamic, most economically and politically stable African countries and will expand further, Boussaid said. Existing investments in Morocco should be complemented by attracting more companies into the sectors of renewable energy, automotive, aeronautics, tourism and agriculture.
The G-20 can set the right conditions with international organizations and partner countries for investments in infrastructure and in small- and medium-sized companies, German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble told reporters after the gathering. “We may not leave Africa’s potential unused,” he said.
--With assistance from Carolynn Look
To contact the reporters on this story: Weixin Zha in Frankfurt at wzha2@bloomberg.net, Rainer Buergin in Berlin at rbuergin1@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Lars Paulsson at lpaulsson@bloomberg.net, Richard Bravo, Paul Gordon
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