Egypt agrees to buy 30 Rafale fighter planes from France. The sale will be done via the French company Dassault. According to the Egyptian Ministry of Defense, the funds to finance this purchase will be obtained through a ten-year loan. However, neither the amount of this loan nor other details of this commercial transaction have been disclosed by the authorities. Paris sees this deal as an...

Last year, Guinea’s economy grew by 7% despite the double health crisis of Covid-19 and Ebola. The good news was reported last April 30 by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) following a virtual mission to the country. The figure is even well above the 5.2% previously forecasted by the Fund. Clara Mira who led the IMF virtual mission said the good performance was mainly driven by the mining...

Polaris Bank Limited, created from the legacy Skye Bank Plc and backed by the Central Bank of Nigeria, released its audited financial results for the year end 2020. The bank saw a wrapping up of N28.9 billion profit before tax, compared to N27.34 billion in 2019. Accordding to the financial statement, this performance is driven by the combination of the significant reduction in interest expenses...

The price of the second-largest cryptocurrency is gaining more weight with the announcement of plans to use its blockchain by major international institutions. The rally started by ETH in the last few days does not seem to be stopping anytime soon. Ether, which is the cryptocurrency based on the Ethereum blockchain, exceeded $3,000 today May 3. This is a new record at $3,056, an...

The Ugandan government has imposed a 12% excise duty on internet data. The Excise Duty Bill 2021, which includes this new tax and was tabled on April 1 by Finance Minister Matia Kasaija (pictured), was passed by the Ugandan Parliament on Thursday 29 April. The new tax officially comes into effect on July 1. Through this charge, which is part of a series of fiscal measures including the...

The French Development Agency says it will disburse CFA26.2 billion to (€40 million) support the Ivorian cotton industry. The sector posted good production results in recent years and wants to maintain the trend. The amount will be pumped into the Resilience of Cotton Systems (Resco) project. The financing agreement was initialed on April 29 by Ivorian Economy Minister Adama Coulibaly, Budget...

Nigeria and The Netherlands, via a virtual event, launched a four-year Collaborative Seed Program (CSP) to address major challenges in the Nigerian seed sector. This program will contribute to the National Seed Roadmap vision that will ensure smallholder farmers in Nigeria have access to adequate, secure, and timely supply of quality seeds to improve their productivity. “We need collaboration...

The fight against poverty and that against climate change can go hand in hand. Indeed many researchers, according to a recent study by Nature Communications, are pushing for 5% of climate dividends to go to poor people in Africa. The experts say these dividends can help reduce both carbon emission and poverty worldwide. They believe that if poor Africans received 5% of the amount, the whole...

The government of Ghana started talks with unions and associations of employers in the country to fix a new minimum wage for 2021. The announcement was made by President Nana Akufo-Addo (pictured) himself on the occasion of the Labor Day placed under the theme “Economic Recovery in an Era of Covid-19; The Role of Social Partners.” This initiative comes in addition to the ongoing measures set...

Last year, the overall debt of frontier markets across the world increased by $120 billion to $3btrillion, according to figures provided by the Institute of International Finance (IIF). The top 3 countries that made the debt level increase include Côte d'Ivoire, Bangladesh, and Romania. The IIF analysis, which focuses on the debts of various economic agents, showed that the amounts...