You’ve probably heard the story of South Korea and Ghana. That just two generations ago, Ghana had a higher per capita GDP than its Asian counterpart, by about a 30% margin. Today, Ghana’s 1967 per capita income of $800 has moved to just $1,800 while Korea sits at around $30,000. Ghana is today famous for its exports of raw gold and cocoa today, while Korea fills our living rooms with its LG televisions, occupies our garages with its Hyundai vehicles, and completes our calls with its Samsung phones. It’s fair now to stop the comparisons between modern Ghana and South Korea.
Another story of Asian glory and African peril you haven’t heard is the one of China and Ethiopia. In 1987, China and Ethiopia had similar per capita incomes. That was also the last year that the two nations had similar per capita incomes. Since then, Ethiopia’s per capita GDP has gone from $238 to just $374, and China has risen from a low of $249 in 1987 to around $5,500 per capita today.
That was the power of the Asian Renaissance, but will Africa experience something similar?
The answer: It already has! According to the Economist recently, 4 of the 10 fastest growing economies projected for 2013 will be in Africa–and Ghana is one of them. A continent that makes up just 15% of the world’s population will account for 40% of the top 10 list this year. The same has been true for 2012, 2011, 2010, and the same will likely be true many years down the line.
Mass communication and technology transfer have also risen rapidly in recent years. The World Bank reported in 2012 that Africa had 650 million mobile phone subscribers, up from just 16 million in 2000, and surpassing both the European Union and the United States. It was the wonder of long-distance cultural exchange that allowed a Moorish scholar’s works to shape the European Renaissance through a Scottish conduit named Michael Scot.
The holy grail
Africa’s greatest asset has still not yet been touched. The continent has billions, perhaps even trillions of barrels of oil and hundreds of trillions of cubic meters of natural gas still untapped. The Democratic Republic of the Congo alone holds an estimated $24 trillion worth of minerals plus untold sums of oil and natural gas reserves, the world’s second largest rainforest, and the world’s second greatest river in total volume. That’s just one African state out of 55. Earlier this decade, exploration teams discovered beneath the coastal waters of Tanzania and Mozambique more than three times the quantity of natural gas of the Black Sea region.
It’s a fact now that Europe has exhausted all of its natural resources, and that nations across Asia are struggling to break into net export territory with their dwindling resources. The Americas aren’t far off from entering that murky territory either. The last vehicle in the lot with juice left in its engine is Africa.
A century ago, the British prioritized their Egyptian colony for its cotton-producing Nile River Delta. Mind you, very little Nile water actually makes it to Egypt. About 80% of the Nile sits in Ethiopia for most of the year. The potential for growth in a place like Ethiopia must be endless if the British made a global force out of Egypt’s comparatively parched Delta region.
Labor
Slavery may be one of the last subjects to discuss lightly in Africa, but it’s an apt metaphor for awaiting opportunity. Amid rising standards of living and higher wage expectations in mid-20th century Europe and North America, the world’s manufacturing responsibilities were transferred to Asia, where a disciplined labor force willing to work for subsistence pay levels.
Demands for higher wages and greater worker rights are already beginning to emanate across Asia as more countries enter the middle income category. Just as unions and workers’ rights campaigns sounded the death knell for manufacturing and production jobs in the Western world, similar demands are forcing companies to abandon Asia for cheaper realms. With the Latin America seeing similar levels of average incomes as Asia, it only leaves Africa as the last remaining frontier for low-wage workers.
In 2009, Hyundai Motor Company teamed up with Ethiopian track superstar Haile Gebreselassie to launch Marathon Motors Engineering, a joint venture project that will build a new line of cars in Ethiopia. Hyundai already has similar partnerships in Egypt and the Sudan with Ghabbour Auto and Giad Auto companies respectively.
Golden age
More than at any other point in history, there is greater contact and solidarity among Africa’s one billion citizens. This element of oneness among Africa’s diverse and disparate cultures will ease communication, transfer of wealth, and the exchange of knowledge, much as it did for Europe centuries ago.
At the start of this young millennium, Angola was locked in the longest modern civil war, but today it is the largest petroleum producer in Africa. Ten years ago, the European Union was hailed as the glue which held a continent together, but today it is the pariah of every one of its member states. Times change, and they change much faster than we are often willing to believe. Africa’s moment of grace is not coming, it is already here, and it is up to you to keep up.
{DN Staff Writers}
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