The development agency FMO made its first commitment of the year 2020 within the investment fund Acumen Resilient Agriculture Fund (ARAF) to provide financial and technical support to farmers in East and West Africa. In the two regions, ARAF will target agribusinesses and agricultural enterprises that develop innovative solutions to adapt to climate change. The fund set up by the impact...

Last year, the South African car industry sold a total 386,863 vehicles on the international market; 10.2% more than the 351,000 cars exported in 2018. According to the National Association of Automobile Manufacturers of South Africa (NAAMSA), the increase was driven by the improved production at the country's main assembly plants. On the local market, however, sales dropped by 2.8% year-on-year...

Mozambique’s public telecom company Tmcel, which was created in January 2019 from the merger of Telecomunicações de Moçambique (TdM) and Mozambique Cellular (Mcel), needs $200 million to invest in several transformative projects in 2020. The information was given by Ana Coanai, president of the state asset management institute IGEPE, in an interview with Noticias. In 2016, when the new...

The Ghanaian technology company Celltel Networks has appointed Ed & Co Capital Limited, a local financial company, as financial advisor in its $500 million Ghana Smart Cities project. A memorandum of understanding was signed to this effect last week in Accra between the founder and executive chairman of Celltel Networks, Prince Kofi Kludjeson, and the managing director of Ed and Co, Emmanuel...

Chinese companies Sunda International and Kenda are planning to build ceramic production plants in several African countries, we learned. The $323 million investment targets Senegal, Cameroon, Mozambique, Zambia and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Sunda International is already well represented in Africa with activities in various trade areas in some 20 countries on the continent. But for...

German development finance institution DEG has granted €2 million (about $2.2 million) to fairafric GmbH, a German company which specializes in the production and marketing of chocolate bars. The beneficiary will use the money to establish a chocolate production plant in Ghana, in response to growing demand. The loan deal is part of the AfricaConnect program, an initiative of the...

Ivorian President Alassane Dramane Ouattara (pictured) expressed his intention to modify the constitution before the end of 2020. The leader said this yesterday Jan 6 when he was presenting his New Year's greetings to the diplomatic corps. “During the first quarter of this year, I will propose to Parliament to make amendments to the Constitution to make it more coherent,” he said. While he...

Egypt's foreign reserves increased by $66 million, reaching $45.420 billion at the end of December 2019, compared to $45.354 billion at the end of November 2019, according to the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE). The country's current average foreign reserves cover about 7.2 months of commodity imports, which is higher than the world average (about three months of imports). The good...

Over the year 2019, Africa attracted a total of $1.3 billion in venture capital funds, WeeTracker said in its African Venture Capital Report 2019. Figures are up 84.6% compared to the $725.6 million recorded in 2018. While the amount of investments increased, the number of transactions completed decreased from 458 in 2018 to 427 in 2019. Out of the 54 African countries covered by the...

Between April and December 2019, a total of 256 civilians died in targeted Islamist attacks in Burkina Faso, Human Rights Watch reported today Jan 6. The conflicts initially started in the country’s Northern Sahel region before spreading to the Boucle du Mouhoun, Nord, Centre-Nord, and Est regions. Since 2015, the rising attacks have killed more than 750 people and forced 560,000 people...