Your curated selection of weekly Africa business and investment headlines.
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Headlines
🎦 Zambia Raises Interest Rate by 50 Basis Points to 14.5%
📖 [DOWNLOAD] Embedding Minerals Sovereignty in Africa’s Mining Value Chains
📸 Countries By Beneficiation of Critical Minerals
🎦 Barrick CEO Discusses Impact of Mali Dispute on Global Mining
Africa
📰 Africa Has Too Many Businesses, Too Little Business
Though there are African entrepreneurs founding innovative startups in everything from fintech to commercial agriculture, running a business is often the result of desperation, not choice. To close the gap with the rest of the world, Africa does not need more small businesses. It needs more large ones… Read More
📰 Nigeria’s GDP Rose by 3.84% in Q4 2024
An improvement from the 3.46% recorded in the same period of 2023, which is attributed to a stronger than expected growth in the services sector… Read More
📰 Despite Ban, The Gambia Remains Major Source of Smuggled Rosewood
Despite the 2022 ban on all timber exports, millions of metric tons of rosewood continue to flow to China from the Gambia. Smugglers move the timber harvested in southern Senegal to Banjul’s port in the Gambia…Read More
🎦 Zambia Raises Interest Rate by 50 Basis Points to 14.5%
Inflation remains stubbornly high, approaching 17%.
[videos for subscribers only]
📰 Remittances to Sub-Saharan Africa Remain Overpriced
Sub-Saharan Africa is still the most expensive region in the world to transfer money to, with an average remittance cost of 8.37% in the second quarter of 2024, according to the World Bank's remittance report. Remittances account for more than 20% of GDP in The Gambia, Lesotho, and the Comoros, as well as more than 10% in Liberia, Cape Verde, and Guinea-Bissau. … Read More
📖 [DOWNLOAD] Embedding Minerals Sovereignty in Africa’s Mining Value Chains [SAIIA Report]
Despite vast reserves of critical minerals such as lithium and rare earth elements, financial barriers – including commodity price volatility, infrastructure deficits and restricted access to capital – perpetuate energy poverty and hinder value chain development.
📸 Countries By Beneficiation of Critical Minerals
📰 Global Investors Eye Nigeria’s Lithium Reserves
Zimbabwe is Africa’s leader which is in the hands of Chinese miners, but Nigeria is eager to claim a piece of the global market. By 2030, Africa is projected to supply 20% of the world’s lithium… Read More
🎦 Barrick CEO Discusses Impact of Mali Dispute on Global Mining
The government has accused Barrick of owing over $500 million in taxes which led to gold shipments being seized and the mine shutting down, temporarily. “Pit to port to China” business models for African miners continue to be risky.
[videos for subscribers only]
📰 DRC Suspends Cobalt Exports for Four Months. Here’s Why.
The move comes after China’s CMOC Group, the world’s largest cobalt miner, more than doubled its output in 2023 to approximately 114,000 metric tons, up from 56,000 tons the previous year, as part of its efforts to expand copper production at its two mines in Congo. It is estimated that over 200,000 people are employed in informal cobalt mining operations across the country.… Read More
📰 Europe Backs AFC’s $750 Million Climate Infrastructure Fund
The EIB today confirmed it will invest $52.48 million in the Fund, which is managed by AFC. The fund has already secured $253 million in commitments from the Green Climate Fund (“GCF”), marking GCF’s largest-ever equity investment in Africa. In addition, the NSIA: Nigeria Sovereign Investment Authority (NSIA) and two private African pension funds have also committed to the Fund… Read More
