Are African Investments Viable Or Not

By Jeremy Carden

When one takes a look at the amount of foreign aid that has streamed into African investments it is rather staggering as no country in the world has had over three billion pumped into it. Although Africa has never really thrived and is the poorest continent over the last few years Africa has really deteriorated and recent statistics show that Africa only accounts for a total of two percent of global production.

Despite the fact that the rest of the world have poured in alarming amounts of money Africa sadly remains bankrupt and this is due to the governmental top dogs use and abuse of these funds as well as excessive debts. Africa is fast losing its professional people as statistic shows a staggering twenty thousand and more people immigrate to other countries.

There are really only three viable sectors of interest which potential investors can invest in such as infrastructure, agriculture and telecommunications according to the world economists. An area which has been severely neglected especially within the last two years is the processing of agriculture and agro which has been noted to be a ripe area for investment as agricultural produce only represents around five percent of the world. 's value on the export markets.

There are many opportunities and interesting insights for investors in the under developed but saturated markets of sub Saharan Africa with regards to mobile penetration and the 3G license boom in North Africa as well as South Africa that has only three mobile networks and one telecommunication service being Telkom.

Morocco launched the first IPTV service in Africa and there is much scepticism as to how the expansion of WIMAX will impact the high service convergence characteristic of other African country. 's telecom sector. The telecom sector has barely been touched in Sudan and the overseas sectors are already pouring in huge sums although most analysts consider this sector to be under explored as there are growth prospects despite political uncertainty and decline in oil prices.

When looking at african investment one needs to look at the infrastructure crisis in Africa as an opportunity rather than looking at the limitations. There are millions of Africans that do not have access to clean water for drinking purposes and many more that are deprived of proper sanitation facilities. If one makes a comparison to the minimal water supply that is used for the purposes of industrial, agricultural as well as hydro electrical power and residential usage only amounts to four percent.

The African continents inhabitant. 's life expectancy is falling rapidly as HIV is rife and accounts for approximately seventy percent of the globes HIV victims and over and above this forty percent of Africans is illiterate and in addition Africa has been rated the lowest as far as human development goes by the UNDP.

There are opportunities as well as returns from african investment as long as investors are willing to face risks as Africa is the last real frontier in emerging markets unlike other markets that are already crowded with private investors whereby Africa does not have that level of competition and some countries have already realized that Africa is on the radar and have identified the potential in Africa. The most attractive African investments are consumer goods and services, banking and domestic infrastructure as well as telecommunications. - 23229

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Want to find out more about african investment, then visit the African Infrastructure and Global Connection's (AI&GC) site on how to choose begin investing in this economy.