‘If you have built a castle in the air your work need not be lost – that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.’ (Henry Thoreau)First, the good news. Africa’s economic pulse has quickened, infusing the continent with a new commercial vibrancy. Real GDP rose by 4.9 percent a year from 2000 through 2008, more than twice its pace in the 1980s and 1990s. Telecommunications, banking, and retailing are flourishing. Construction is booming. Private-investment inflows are surging. Africa’s collective GDP, at $1.6 trillion in 2008, is now roughly equal to Brazil’s or Russia’s, and according to the McKinsey Quarterly, ‘What’s driving Africa’s growth’ (2010), the continent is among the world’s most rapidly growing economic regions. This acceleration is a sign of hard-earned progress and future promise.
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