Great expectations

摘要

"Jobs, houses and good schools," said a J woman in Soweto, a poor township near Johannesburg, when asked what an African recovery plan should be about. At bottom, this is the aim of the New Partnership for Africa's Development (Nepad), a wonderfully ambitious plan devised by African leaders to end the isolation of their continent. But can it really bring people some of what they want? The plan, which will be officially launched at the G8 meeting in Canada on June 26th-27th, hopes to fetch Africa an additional $64 billion or so each year. It intends to do so partly by encouraging exports, partly by assuaging the doubts that foreign investors, donors and wealthy Africans have about the continent's stability.