20100122
allafrica

The World Bank group President Robert Zoellick is set to start an eight-day, three-nation Africa visit next Tuesday to help focus the attention of African governments, development partners and private investors on seizing the opportunity for renewed momentum in economic growth and overcoming poverty.

A statement released in Dar es Salaam yesterday said Mr Zoellick will first head to Sierra Leone before travelling to Cote d'Ivoire and then Ethiopia for the African Union (AU) summit.

Ahead of the trip, Zoellick noted that many sub-Saharan African countries had enjoyed a decade of solid growth before the crisis and it was important to preserve and expand on these gains by drawing investment to high growth areas.

He said although hit by the global food, fuel and financial crises, African governments have persisted in strengthening their economic policies as they pursue development, or rebuild after conflict.

"I am visiting Africa to learn about how its people have coped with the global economic crisis and to see how the World Bank Group can work with them to improve prospects for economic growth and expanded opportunity.

Much of Africa has a solid record of economic growth, including in some of Africa's fragile states, and it has the potential to be another pole of growth for the world economy," Mr Zoellick was quoted by the statement as saying.

In Addis Ababa Mr Zoellick will co-host, together with African Development Bank President Donald Kaberuka, a working breakfast forum on the sidelines of the AU summit where several African leaders will discuss the transformative impact that information and communications technologies (ICTs) can have on the continent.

"The skeptics wondered whether Africa was ready for a revolution in telecommunications. But African entrepreneurs, with the help of supportive government policies, changed the facts on the ground," said Zoellick.

Mr Zoellick said that a combination of policy and institutional reforms and external resources are urgently needed to help build capacity, generate economic opportunities in fragile states, and lay the foundation for stability and overcoming poverty.

He also called for policies and investments that would expand Africa's share of global and intra-African trade by fostering regional integration and building crucial infrastructure in energy, transport and irrigation needed to promote agriculture, manufacturing and industrialization on the continent and for helping countries adapt to climate change.

Acknowledging that private sector participation will continue to be key to take Africa to the next level of high-speed connectivity and to create jobs, the breakfast forum is expected to urge African leaders to further lift barriers to private investment in the sector.

It is also expected to encourage African leaders and the private sector to take advantage of ICTs to advance agriculture, education and health sectors, and to similarly realize the considerable promise of other sectors.

During his trip, Zoellick will visit energy, agriculture and fishery projects that have benefited from WB support.

He will hold working sessions with representatives of other donor agencies; discuss ways of boosting World Bank support to governmental and civil society organizations promoting peace, transparency, accountability, and good governance, the statement said.