Latest Business Trends in Africa

 Social Media. With the rise of information, came about a problem. Before the information age, you needed people to be in the picture for you to get access to information. And if you think about knowledge being the way in which information was used, you’ll realise also that in the past, every business needed real people to teach them how information could be used. In the past also, you needed a customer to be physically present in order to transact a business. With the information and knowledge age happening through the internet, business became more and more divorced from people. After so many years of the information age, the world has realized that human beings are indeed social animals and there was a need for the human reconnection. Every serious business will have to find a way to harness the capabilities of FaceBook, Twitter, Google+ etc (and in that order) as a means to enhance their sales and marketing strategy and to get consumer insight

Mobile Money. Even the most pessimistic observers of Africa’s technology potential marvel at the sheer scale and impact of M-Pesa. By some estimates, more than 11% of Kenya’s GDP is made up of transactions powered by M-Pesa. M-Pesa represents a vast new opportunity for the continent: fast, secure, culturally accessible transactions.
Many Commercial banks and microfinance institutions have already partnered with the mobile money service providers and this trend will increase  further to enable more transactions like cash deposits and withdraws from a nearby local mobile money agent!

African mobile phone apps to solve African problems. We've heard enough by now about how cell phones are ubiquitous all over the world, including in countries where some people have more access to mobile phones than to adequate sanitation.
Phone apps have been developed to let people check market prices for their goods, helping them to avoid a situation in which they do not get a fair price because they have no way of knowing the current market rate. Another amazing program is using climate data and text messaging to help farmers get insured for crops lost to poor weather. Other apps have been developed for agricultural production, sanitation, healthcare, and the mother of all Africa's problems; corruption (Yes! Kleptocracy Fighters Inc, one of the more recent apps to be developed, has generated yet another noble purpose for text messages!). We will witness more apps coming up to help solve many problems.

An African Tablet for Africa. (Im talking about the tablet comuters, not the medicine!) African innovators have bought into the tablet concept with vigour. Whether it is Nigeria’s Encipher, Congo-Brazzaville’s VMK, Ghana’s rLG and Kludjeson, or even more daringly, Cameroon’s cardiopad, which aims to offer a cardiograph (ECG) service on the go, Africans are investing considerable entrepreneurial and intellectual resources into devising a portable computer system that can serve Africa’s users. Other countries like Kenya, Botswana, Zimbabwe followed suit and soon, most African countries will reduce dependence on China for tablets and smart phones. The new global supply chain has changed previous notions of manufacturing. Africa doesn’t need to line up all its ducks in a row before entering high-value manufacturing, and these tablet visionaries are working hard to prove that.

Partnerships, Mergers & Acquisitions. Almost every business wants to grow. The shareholders, the directors, the employees all want the organisation to grow. They may all have different reasons for wanting such a growth but the bottom line is they all want the growth. Every business grows by either increasing its share in the existing market or finding its way into new markets. There are many ways of achieving any of these but traditionally, there are two ways:
Building the growth. This is the hard method where everybody in the company has to work very very hard to grow the company internally. Second option is to buy the growth – through a merger or an acquisition. Mergers and Acquisitions appear to be the easiest option and across Africa, more mergers will be seen,in a bid to tap into the over 1 Billion market. (Airtel merged with Warid; imagine the possibilities!)

Microfinance. Across Africa, a new trend of microfinance has emerged to cater for entrepreneurs in fast-turnover business. The growing availability of capital, even if it is still expensive, is largely to account for the fast growth of the so-called economic middle class, which many believe will become a social, cultural, and political middle class, transforming Africa as a consequence.
This trend will continue growing, with more microfinance institutions growing into microfinance commercial banks and others merging to become commercial banks to bridge the finance gap and tap the profits there in.

Green movement. The remaining green environment of Africa and other developing countries is the salvation for the rest of the world. Why? Because scientists have now proven that the more green environments disappear, the more rising temperatures the world will have to endure, the more droughts and farming, the more tsunamis etc. Africa is soon going to be under pressure to stay green. The whole idea about a green business is that businesses are required to actively ensure that their operational activities are either NOT harming the environment or are actively helping to keep the world’s green environment green. As a result, it is no more enough to just say “we care about the environment” – your business has to demonstrate it. There will be more 'green' CSR, more gorwth of the solar energy sector and more use of Liquid Petroleum Gas in homes.

Single tourist visa. Uganda, Kenya and Rwanda have approved the use of national identity cards as travel documents and the issuance of a single tourist visa.The $100 visa valid for 90 days will be paid at the point of entry or in foreign missions and each state will take a share of $30.
However, the country that processes the visa entry will receive an extra $10 in an administration cost. The document, referred to as the 'East Africa Tourist Visa,' is green in colour. It has emblems of the three countries, common wildlife, place of validity, a unique visa number and spaces for personal data. This is good news for those tourists who like making African safaris and to tourism operators in these 3 countries. The successful implelemtation of this will prompt other countries to follow suit, making African tourism grow in leaps!

Oil mining and refinery; every silver lining has a cloud. The world has produced about 1 trillion barrels of crude oil to date. Over the next century or so, approximately 2 trillion barrels more are expected to be produced from conventional proved reserves and undiscovered conventional oil. Oil is one of the most powerful tools of trade in the world. The most powerful countries in the world hold great control over the resource that is needed to run almost everything right from the huge industries to simple generators in the home. Africa is one of the world largest oil producers after the Middle East. With more countries in Africa making plans to start mining and refining their oil, Africa's share in the oil industry will grow with countries like Uganda, Ghana, Ethiopia, Kenya and Tanzania starting production.
However, if oil mining is not governed well, with oil mining benefits comes the related 'oil curse' of conflict which has started unfortunately in Africa's youngest nation, South Sudan. We hope this doens not spread to other countries.

Azonto & the African sound  and Gesture. If you go onto Youtube and find American soldiers in Baghdad doing some batty dance moves then rush downstairs for your favourite or least favourite copy of Noam Chomsky. There is nothing geopolitical about this… or maybe there is. A Ghanaian dance phenomenon (Azonto) is slowly taking the world by storm.
African rhythm has long been viewed as exceptionally moving, but Africa has so far failed to grasp onto that as one way of changing perceptions about the continent, by getting ordinary non-Africans to develop a sentimental bond with the place minus all the hyperbole, melodrama and tragicomedy. More African artistes will join the major record labels in the world since the rest of the world has finally accepted and fallen more in love with the African rhythm.

If the rest of the world can dance with Africa, they can do business more heartily with it.