DRAFT Improving the SMEs Access to Trade Finance
in the OIC Member States
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Similarly, the Asia-centric magnetic pull is in evidence in the trade and investment flows
between China and Africa – focused on commodities and on infrastructure-related import
activity, are reshaping the current reality and the evolutionary direction of the African
continent.
The linkages between Asia and Africa and the growing focus on intra-Africa collaboration, from
trade to regional integration, are transforming a continent and stand in stark contrast to the
colonial experiences of many African economies, apparently exhibiting an unfamiliar flavour of
collaboration that is, if not fully accepted at face value, nonetheless welcome.
3.2.3. Africa
Africa is identified as a continent with tremendous long term potential provided certain
systemic issues, like the level of economic engagement of the population and issues of
corruption can be mitigated or addressed in the medium term. Without seeking to overstate
the case, Africa is making serious attempts to some degree at least, to foster regional and
perhaps continental collaboration in several respects.
Whether one looks at the SADC, COMESA, ECOWAS or other initiatives aimed at enabling some
form of economic integration, these initiatives evidence a desire to overcome historical
challenges and to look forward in terms of economic activity, development and growth,
including trade.
Africa, like Asia and the Middle East, is anything but homogenous in character and includes
within its sphere, economies that currently exhibit significant potential, while at the same
time, counting among its member economies some jurisdictions that face the harshest of
conditions, amounting in one or two cases, to chaotic failed states. At the same time, other
economies have shown significant potential at various points in the last fifty years – from
Ethiopia and its pre-drought characterization as the “bread basket of Africa” to Ghana that
went from desperate conditions to once being held up as a model of successful development,
or Rwanda that is recovering from the horrors of its recent past.
Investment flows into Africa, and GDP growth rates at the continental level have compared
favourably with similar metrics linked to the BRIC economies, as illustrated in the graphic
below.