Author: Len Ishmael
Site of publication: Policycenter
Type of publication: Policy Paper
Date of publication: February 2022
The 2022 EU-AFRICA summit represents a pivotal moment in the relationship between neighbors.
For the EU-Africa relationship to be meaningful, it must be relevant to Africa’s needs. This paper argues that competition for Africa is not in Africa’s or in the EU’s interest. Instead, Africa should be seen as an area of cooperation. The foundation exists for EU collaboration with China and other actors in supporting Africa’s development.
A complex and evolving relationship
Africa had been calling for an equal partnership and a greater say in the dynamics of the relationship. Therefore, the new EU-Africa strategy should be assessed against qualitative and quantitative determinants of a meaningful and fair partnership.
Inevitably, the EU offerings under the new strategy will come in for some cross- comparative analysis, as higher levels of cooperation offered by China as its model of development cooperation with the continent continues to evolve.
Important, too, is the fact that the summit will have convened in the third year of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. So far, the mechanisms put in place to support the issue of the significant new debt undertaken by developing countries in response to the pandemic have failed to provide the support needed.
Issues of race and reparations, return of cultural artefacts, and other issues reflect the global debate among and within societies with colonial pasts and frame the wider landscape of conversations within which EU and African values and interests are not in sync.
The EU-Africa partnership, however, continues to be valued by both groups.
The EU delivers vital support and much-needed resources to Africa in several areas, including development cooperation, peace and security, and is an important investor in Africa’s future. Africa is growing as a market of importance to Europe. It is a valuable source of raw materials, and the two collaborate on several issues, including migration and fighting terrorism.
The EU-Africa partnership in an evolving geopolitical landscape
Far from engaging in competition for Africa, the EU’s new partnership with Africa should be one that treats Africa as a zone for great power collaboration and not competition.
Africa’s importance to Europe goes beyond that of access to Africa’s markets and valuable raw materials and is related to the complex nexus between Africa’s development and stability – and Europe’s security.
On multiple fronts, the EU sees the development of Africa as being inextricably linked to Europe’s own future political, economic and social security and stability.
Snapshot of Africa’s development challenges
- Poverty rates are decreasing everywhere else in the world, with the exception of sub-Saharan Africa.
- Africa’s economy is characterized by significant dependence on a few sectors such as mining, hydrocarbons and commodities, with little by way of higher value components best placed to create high levels of jobs.
- Africa’s business sector faces an array of crippling constraints, including poor governance and government policies.
- Among the continent’s biggest challenges are the significant twin deficits in both human and capital infrastructure investments.
- Africa is one of the world’s continents most lagging with regards to investments in capital infrastructure.
Measuring the new EU-Africa strategy against Africa’s priorities
Many African countries are seeking renegotiated terms of trade to create value-added components to exports through policies supportive of industrialization and manufacturing and greater access to EU markets for finished goods.
African leaders have also identified investments in capital infrastructure as a way to integrate both the continent’s internal markets and as a means to integrate Africa into global value chains, essential to the continent’s economic transformation
While the EU has trade measures in place for the Least Developed Countries, Africa’s middle-income countries require terms of trade supportive of their development.
African leaders have also identified investments in capital infrastructure as a way to integrate both the continent’s internal markets and as a means to integrate Africa into global value chains, essential to the continent’s economic transformation.
The strategy : a critique
Several areas have come in for criticism. These include the view that “African leaders and civil society on both sides did not play a sufficiently meaningful role in the strategy’s formulation”.
There has been a lack of focus in the new strategy on several issues, such as: rural development, too narrow a focus on economic growth and private investment, the blanket approach to the framing of initiatives despite the complex diversity of Africa, a failure to acknowledge the legacy of the colonial past, inadequate treatment of areas of conflicting interests.
Beyond the sense that policies critical to Africa’s economic transformation are not covered in the strategy, implementation problems are looming.
In addition, the notion of shared values poses problems in some respects, as Africa and the EU view specific values through different lenses and entry points. For example, in Africa, as in many parts of the developing world, it is not unusual for governments to champion the view that a clear path to a nation’s development puts economic growth first.
Building on trends and renegotiating terms of trade
Africa’s partnerships have diversified, and other actors are also playing important roles in supporting the continent’s development. Chinese investments in capital infrastructure in Africa are opening new areas for development and can generate wins on all fronts for Africa, Europe, and China, and would be in Africa’s best interests.
European and African demographics are trending in opposite directions. Africa’s need to create jobs and Europe’s impending skills gap can both benefit from an agenda of cooperation around the labor market, education, and skills, with the potential to unlock future benefits for both continents.
At the current time, the practice of informal apprenticeships across Africa plays an important role in skills training. Investments aimed at modernizing and upgrading informal apprenticeships coupled with greater access to work-based learning programs can boost the employability of African youth.
Africa is developing home-grown models of South-South cooperation and regional hubs in the various Regional Economic Communities (RECs) that have developed into important centers within expansive hinterlands. A practical, differentiated programme of support to African countries and regions via the EU-Africa partnership would be in keeping with the continent’s diversity, and regional hubs.
European and African demographics are trending in opposite directions. Africa’s need to create jobs and Europe’s impending skills gap can both benefit from an agenda of cooperation around the labor market, education, and skills, with the potential to unlock future benefits for both continents
In addition, to leverage the growing investments in connectivity across the continent, the EU Strategy can provide the basis of support to Africa’s digitalization.
Africa’s active participation in its development is the sine qua non if the relationship with Europe is to become a partnership of equals’ and Africa too can support its cause by deepening unity in purpose to allow it to harvest the increasing leverage which it can bring to the table in discussions with the EU and its other partners.
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