Sub-Saharan Africa’s Economic Growth Is Poised For Acceleration - New World Bank Report - April 2012

According to the new World Bank report on Africa's economy - Africa's Pulse - released on Wednesday 18 April 2012, economic growth in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) remains strong and is poised for lift-off after growing at 4.9 percent in 2011, just shy of the pre-crisis average of 5 percent. Excluding South Africa, which accounts for over a third of the region's GDP, growth in the rest of the region was 5.9 percent, making it one of the fastest growing developing regions.

Taking advantage of being in the "wrong place" (Africa) at the right time (21st century)

In the last two decades when the North American and European newspapers described Africa as the "hopeless continent", no one at the time could have anticipated that in the next twenty years, Europe will be in economic turmoil and the US will be running into trillions of dollars in debts surpassing the debt ceiling. Today, the world newspapers are covering the opposite. The North is the victim of its own success and the South is pregnant with opportunities. Wolfgang Fengler, the World Bank's Lead Economist in the Nairobi Office of the World Bank covering East Africa, puts this into perspective in his article entitled 'big shifts and what they mean for Africa and Kenya'. There's no doubt that a sizable number of countries in the African continents are virgin territories from economic perspective as massive mineral resources are yet to be exploited. 

Jim O'Neill, the founder of BRIC nations acronym, whether by design or default, omitted  the continent as the emerging market giant, and as an economist running an arguably largest investment bank, could not forecast this phenomenon. As things stand, he lost the drive of his 'invention' as the nations he grouped are pursuing their own agenda than the one he sought to achieve and proof. The very same nations are recognizing the African continent as the key market for future growth of the global economy. Nationwide Finance, the US-based private placement lending facilitator, sees the African continent offering many opportunities for new export and import markets. For investors positioning themselves in Africa while the continent is addressing its own challenges amid remarkable GDP growth rates in the last decade relative to the developed and other emerging markets, are in for a good treat in the long-term. For them, it is the investment appetite and marketing principle of taking advantage of being in the wrong place at the right time.