Rabat – King Mohammed VI has said that Africa is in need of a “real investment industry” that would be capable of mobilizing capital sustainably and ensure integration into financial markets across the continent.
The statement came in a message sent on Monday to participants at the launch conference for the African Forum of Foreign Investors (ASIF), held in Rabat, Morocco’s Maroc Agence Press (MAP) reported on Monday.
The King added that sovereign and strategic investment funds are powerful indicators of opportunities and will provide incentives to better allocate resources to create economic value and social impact.
“Access to capital remains timid and mainly dominated by funding from agencies and development banks,” he noted in the message that was read by Minister of Economy and Finance Fouzi Lekjaa, adding that it’s time for Africa to “assert itself.”
To achieve financial self-sufficiency, sovereign funds across Africa have to link long-term national priorities for the countries with private investors in order to achieve sustainable development, the King argued.
Highlighting the importance of cooperation with other African countries, King Mohammed VI also talked about Moroccan efforts to invest in the continent in such a way, reiterating Morocco’s commitment to African cooperation.
For a region like Africa which still suffers from economic and social issues, building a domestic or regional investment infrastructure might be necessary to be competitive on the global stage.
As foreign investments can have the potential of interfering with developing nations’ sovereignty, they look more towards implementing domestic investment measures to ensure their independence.
Among the investments that Morocco has made in this regard are the establishment of fertilizer production plants in African nations to strengthen the continent’s food security, energy projects such as the Nigeria-Morocco pipeline, and vaccine production plants to help it recover from the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and future epidemics.
