President Adama Barrow has told stakeholders gathered in Banjul for the 7th edition of the Financial Afrik Awards on Friday that public-private partnerships are inevitability for investments and necessary pillars for development across Africa.
According to President Barrow, public private partnerships as an alternative to public debt, the working theme of the conference could not have been more relavant to this day and age when the continent is opening up for business with the world and realsing the benefits of cooperations arising from these collaborations.
Declaring the deliberations open at the Sir Dawda Jawara International Conference Centre outside Banjul, President Barrow was emphatic in underscoring the role of PPPs on the continent’s future prosperity given that governments across Africa have been coming under unyielding pressure from their publics to meet aspirations that had been missed for decades.
”In this context ppps and blended finance and innovative investment structures are no longer optional instruments of sustainable development. They are necessary pillars for sustainable development” he told delegates drawn from 23 African countries including Senegal, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Nigeria, Sierra Leone and South Africa among others.
France and the Arab world were also represented at the discourse which President Barrow suggested should ”move beyond dialogue and focus on practical banking solutions and mobilise private capital, leveraging developmant finance and deliver measureable impacts”.
He also spoke about the state of interdependence between Africa and the Arab world, two regions that share deep historical ties, complementary strengths and a shared future, hence the unmistakable involvement of Middle Eastern interest on the continent.
”While the continent offers opportunities and a young and dynamic population, the Arab world brings capital, expertise and global connectivity and working together can bring mutually beneficial progress and transformative partnerships” he added.
He mentioned the Arab-Africa Roundtable and the Investment in The Gambia Forum as two facilities deliberately tailored ”to strengthen this cooperation by bringing together policy leadership, financial institutions and private investors to deliberate around concrete implementable projects”.
The Gambian leader said the presence of regional ministers of finance and trade, CEO, policymakers of sovereign wealth funds, reprsentatives of financial development institutions and the private sector underscores the strategic importance and continental relevance of the discourse on PPPs focusing on how they impact investments in sectors of the economy requiring new capital injection to build the future of a continent with enormous potential.
The Gambian leader later went on a conducted tour of business stands at the foya of the conference centre, displaying products from Senegal, The Gambia and other countries which include handmade items.
The conference ends later on Friday with a gala evening to name and celebrate Africa’s 100 most outstanding shapers of the continent’s economic landscape over the past year.
The awardees are usually chosen through what Financial Afrik Awards says is a rigorous process and based on the level of impact of their visions, decisions and contributions on economic development in countries on the continent.
