India’s Covid catastrophe and the lessons for governments around the world on preparing for the next wave.



I arrived in Delhi with my wife on 15th April 2021 as the Covid-19 pandemic had started to rage through our country. Our only motivation was to be with our respective mothers who live alone in Delhi. When we landed in Delhi, things were relatively normal, and on the surface, it was almost business as usual. The first telltale sign of the impending chaos was when we did not get our test reports from the PCR tests that were taken on arrival in Delhi. The word ‘normal’ is relative, as for most other countries in the world, 250,000 cases a day would have been catastrophic. In a matter of two weeks, and as I write this piece, the cases crossed 400,000 on 30th April 2021 with no end in sight. Our hindsight pundits say that the peak will signal approximately 500,000 cases a day or over 3.5 million cases a week. The scale of this problem is gigantic and as news has spread across the globe, people are shocked and the affected are incensed and outraged by the lack of preparedness.



There was no reason for a country like India to not be prepared. Just a few months back, we had proudly positioned ourselves as the vaccine capital of the world. How did we go from being the hunter to the hunted in three months? How did we ignore the words of the Director-General of the World Health Organization who categorically stated that the next wave was going to be deadly?



I have watched the news over the last few weeks and sadly seen that the finger-pointing does not stop even during times of calamity. With all the human suffering that we have witnessed, there is no one who has the moral courage and integrity to accept that he or she has made an error in judgement. Our judiciary at the highest level had to point out to the Election Commission of India that they failed the people of the country by continuing with elections in three regions. The only people that have stayed the course are the frontline workers who have remained resolute in their resolve to help save human lives. The poor as always face the brunt of any calamity and this has been no different in this case. However, for once, the rich have not been spared either. People with millions in their bank accounts have fallen prey to this pandemic as in the end all they needed was an extract from freely available air and yet it was in short supply. No amount of money could help people source oxygen or find a hospital bed. The current virus is far more contagious and spreading faster through the air. The catastrophe has seen no caste, creed or economic disparity; everyone has suffered. The agony and despair of the people of our country have been beyond any human suffering that I have witnessed during my life. And yet, we will get past even this; such is the tenacity of human beings.



The citizens of India have suffered as a consequence of serious and inexcusable omissions and negligence on the part of the national and state leadership; every one of them. However, the people of the country must take responsibility for their reckless conduct leading to this disaster that will set our country back from its path to recovery. Not adhering to social distancing and taking the vaccination drive seriously are two major errors of judgement by the people. When disaster struck, everyone wanted to be vaccinated at the same time causing a system overload. I would like to take this opportunity to highlight some of the immediate actions that African and other governments must take on a war footing.



The biggest failure is stakeholder communications. The people of India were given to believe that the pandemic was over in February 2021. Politicians thumped their chests as they did their victory laps taking credit for beating the virus. This gave a false sense of security and people put their guards down and started behaving like it was business as usual. Clear communication from the government must continue indicating in no uncertain terms that the crisis is far from over.



Until a majority of the population has been vaccinated, all major events (of whatsoever nature including weddings, sports, religious or political campaigning) must be cancelled or held virtually. For everything else including office and other entertainment, dining and retail activities, all social distancing protocols must be followed meticulously. We have learned from 2020 that 100% lockdowns may not be necessary and to find the right balance, where needed, consider localized restrictions in infection zones. Lockdowns should be used as a measure of last resort as they are likely to do more damage than good.



Linked to vaccinations is the importance of testing. Governments must set up more labs for testing at reasonable costs and continue testing its constituents for the infection and also determine any variations or mutations to the virus until the vaccination drive is conclusively completed.



All governments must revert back to March 2020 and begin ramping up their healthcare infrastructure. This is the time to build additional ICU capacity in hospitals and infrastructure at several temporary purpose-built facilities that can take on overflows from hospitals. Some facilities should be built beforehand and others must be stored in semi-knocked-down condition in warehouses should the need arise. All hospitals must have adequate ambulance services available to move people as necessary.



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">“The pharmaceutical sector must be given incentives in Africa so that capacity to produce medicines is enhanced exponentially. Collaboration must be set up with international companies to enhance both patented and generic medicines so that developing countries are not treated with lower priority when it comes to healthcare; all human lives are equally valuable.”</blockquote>



Ramp up oxygen production capacity and ensure that the storage of 50% excess capacity than normal national utilization targets are kept in reserve. This has proven to be the lifeline for Covid patients. In the same vein, all other oxygen infrastructure should be ramped up, including concentrators and other devices that can be used at home by people. The experience in India has been that for this particular virus, home care has been far more effective for a majority of the cases. For that, freely available support systems for home use are invaluable.



The only cure to the pandemic is an aggressive vaccination policy. There is no cure other than getting vaccinated and governments must procure vaccinations and make them available at a reasonable cost (if not free) to the entire nation. Countries that are behind on the vaccination drive must ramp it up and carry out a campaign to educate people on the urgent need to get vaccinated. There is clear evidence of lower incidences in countries where the vaccination rates are high. For Africa, I believe that the DFIs must immediately look at setting up infrastructure to become self-reliant on vaccines for the future. This is not an option; if anything is to be learned, no time must be wasted on this. It’s not rocket science and immediate action must be taken to develop the pharma industry expeditiously.



The pharmaceutical sector must be given incentives in Africa so that capacity to produce medicines is enhanced exponentially. Collaboration must be set up with international companies to enhance both patented and generic medicines so that developing countries are not treated with lower priority when it comes to healthcare; all human lives are equally valuable. Capacity must also be built for other hygiene products including masks, sanitizers, PPEs and other essential items.



An area that needs attention is the training of healthcare workers. The pandemic is contagious and care-givers need to be trained to stay out of harm’s way. The only way this can be done is to improve the quality of training of all frontline workers.



My next comment is on the role of the media. Being a media owner myself, I understand the need for accurate and actionable news but there rests an enormous responsibility in finding a balance between highlighting negligence and fueling chaos. Remember one thing always, that no government or administration ever wants to harm its people; this must remain an intrinsic belief at all times. As a case study, in India, over the last two weeks, there has been a frenzy in the Indian media regarding lapses in the preparation and the state of affairs at hospitals. While on the one hand, it served the very important purpose of holding public servants accountable for the absolute mismanagement of this crisis, the media created unintended fear in the public. This fear resulted in people going to hospitals the minute they tested positive thus clogging the system; there was a run on oxygen cylinders and concentrators as people began hoarding them and finally, there was a run on pharmacies that ran out of essential medicines because even people who did not need medicines, as a precaution, began storing them. What then emerged was a black market that has preyed on the sick and despondent.



It is my request to all media businesses around the world to begin devoting more than a cursory mention to the awareness campaigns around the pandemic. More inventory needs to be devoted towards educating people on the actions to be taken when the next wave arrives, the importance of vaccination and most importantly, on responsible social behavior. The best cure still is wearing masks, social distancing and sanitizing one’s hands regularly. If and when the next wave hits, the media must spend more time on educating people on taking precautions and symptoms management so that everyone does not run to hospital. If you can educate even a few people, you would have done your duty to humanity. Remember this is far from over and the lessons from India must be taken seriously by all governments around the world. Prepare for the next wave or history will repeat itself.



– The writer is the Founder and Publisher of FORBES AFRICA

Rakesh Wahi

From The Eye Of The Storm

Agriculture has become an increasingly crucial issue for African governments. Poor infrastructure and lack of long-term finance have been fingered as the culprits blocking Africa’s path to food security.
Africa’s last decade belonged to telecommunications. To achieve meaningful development, the next decade must witness massive investment and progress in the education, healthcare, electricity, water, road, rail and air transport sectors. This means economic diversification, urban decongestion and its economic gains, namely, rural development, inclusive growth, innovation, heightened productivity and spiraling employment.
Solid infrastructure will boost knowledge and agro-produce exchange between African nations.
Beyond infrastructure development and food security concerns, expanding food production will also have a positive impact on local and regional labor markets, as more people are absorbed into the agribusiness value chain.
Small scale farms produce 80% of the food consumed across Africa. Consequently, the agribusiness value chain is a short one, delivering little value to national economies. According to the African Export-Import Bank, Africa’s global share of food processing is less than 20%.
The paucity of processing, trading and retail mechanisms has restricted Africa’s agribusiness sector to the bottom of the socio-economic pyramid. The current practice of just cultivating-to-sell restricts the value chain to a primary commodity-level activity. Service providers involved in input supplies (seeds, fertilizers, machinery), packaging, exporting, transportation, processing, and converting basic produce into finished goods are urgently needed to extend the value chain. De-risking the sector might also require the establishment of public and private-sector initiatives which enable farms and agro-allied concerns to access bio- and agro-technology, financial credit and risk assurance.
According to the World Bank, Africa’s agriculture sector could be worth $1 trillion by 2030 if infrastructure and financing challenges are overcome.
Slightly over 60% of all the uncultivated arable land in the world is in Africa. In Nigeria, only 40% of its 84 million hectares of arable land is cultivated. These productivity gaps can become Africa’s competitive edge.
Coming out of the 23rd AU Summit of Heads of State and Government in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea, last July, African leaders adopted the Malabo Declaration, reinforcing a decade-old commitment (the 2003 Maputo Declaration) to end hunger and cut poverty in half by 2025.
To meet this lofty goal, the leaders reaffirmed their resolve to devote at least 10% of their national budgets to agricultural development. Only 10 countries have so far met this target. The Malabo Declaration raises the bar of focus and commitment to smallholder farmers and rural communities across the continent, says One.org, a campaigning and advocacy group which helped to galvanize pan-African and global support for the pact.
Africa’s leaders however stopped short of agreeing on a common formula for measuring the 10% target. Whichever way one looks at this matter, the key point is that the local and international appetite for Africa’s agribusiness sector has picked up.
Embedded in the declaration are a set of risk management and strategic corporate social objectives namely, operationalization of the African Investment Bank; increased support for intra-regional trade; adoption of climate-resilient farming strategies; responsible private sector investment; youth inclusion and employment targets; and mutual accountability for results.
Hopefully, Africa’s next decade will be fruitful. Ethiopia, South Africa and Kenya seem well adjusted to the nuances of commercial and small-scale farming, producing and exporting excellent quality coffee, wine, citrus, vegetables, tea and flowers.
In Nigeria, an     Agricultural Transformation Agenda (ATA) has transformed a once comatose sector into an engine of growth. Food imports declined from $19 billion in 2011 to $4.35 billion in 2013; bank lending to the sector as a share of total loans has also risen from 0.7% to 6% within two years. Over $4 billion private sector investment commitments has also been attracted to Nigerian agriculture over the last three years.
Earlier this year, Aliko Dangote, president of Dangote Industries, reached out to Kenya for agro-expertise. The Kenyans initially hesitated, pointing at Boko Haram and Ebola as the reasons why they feared coming to West Africa. But when they were offered a remuneration package that was too sweet to refuse, they accepted the challenge. They are now supporting Dangote’s sugarcane fields in Nigeria.
Money talks and agriculture is a multi-billion dollar business.

YOU CAN GROW MONEY  AFTER ALL

It has since dawned on some in the tourism industry that unless they use their stature and influence to lobby their governments to do more to protect the species and by extension, their business, they stand to lose out. Their argument is that if there are no rhinos to see, they cannot sell the Big Five to potential tourists.
The world’s most powerful women should be getting into something that some might say is not exactly their business: the physical, emotional and sexual abuse of women less powerful than themselves.
There are businesswomen’s associations that help to fund halfway stations where women recovering from or fleeing their abusive partners can learn business principles that can help them be independent once they leave their tormentors. Such associations should lobby their governments to improve conditions of girls and women and tighten punitive measures for those who hurt, abuse and marginalize women.
The logic is simple. The more women do not need to depend on men, the less they will tolerate abusive men. The more women there are in business, especially if they are confident in their femininity, the greater the chances of the feminine motif becoming the norm in the business world and in the executive suite.
It is not enough to assume that being a woman means you can understand the plight of a woman in an abusive relationship. Even if you did, unless there are programs in place in your  business that recognize the debilitating effects of patriarchy on productive capacity and therefore the bottom line, you are no better than those who see or hear no evil.
I am not holding my breath that business is ready for such a leap of faith in the interest of abused women and marginalized girls. Far too many still go with the logic that the business of business is business. Everything else is someone else’s business – the preacher, the teacher or the politician.
I continue hearing about how women boast about what they have had to go through, implying that others who want to attain the same status must also grin, bear and get on with it. And still some insist that having a female boss is better for one’s self-worth.
I don’t know if it is just me, but one hardly sees powerful women – except in their capacity as government officials or public representatives – become champions of the anti-woman abuse movement. The rest of the time, it is the less glamorous women in non-governmental organizations, academia or in the arts, who are left to make the big deal of this social scourge and drain to the economy.
It seems to me that powerful women do not want to risk their power reputation by associating themselves with what they might see as being weak or the doormat at home.
I can see why some women would not want to contaminate their reputation as tough task masters who drive a hard bargain by confessing to have been pushed around like British TV personality Nigella Lawson. But it is the recognition that there are many other Nigellas and that businesswomen’s associations can become socially relevant and inspirational to the women who do not yet own a power suit or have not yet been invited for high tea.
There is also the economic impact of women who are prevented from earning a living and being financially independent by abusive partners, or who are forced to divert their earnings into areas that are not as productive as they could have been.
Women should not be forced to buy make-up only if the intention is to hide the marks and scars on their faces if they could be investing that money into areas that grow their wealth and independence.
There is also the denialism in the top echelons of business that makes top businesswomen or executives pretend that abuse is only suffered by others with a less net worth than themselves or who hold mundane jobs.
Some may say that I am blaming the victim by not addressing the patriarchal power that places women in these situations. Perhaps I am. What is clear to me though is that it is those who feel and have known the discomfort of a stone in the shoe, who are best placed to remove the stone. Demanding that whoever placed the stone there remove it, might slow you down.
The stories we hear about women needing to juggle being wives, partners, parents and business executives should not be used as a demand for sympathy or a self-pat on the back. It should be a catalyst for change that is driven by those who understand the pain and unnecessary hurdles it has brought and ensure it does not happen to other women.

Get The Stone Out Of Your Shoe

Philanthropy is entering what some economists and academics believe is another golden age. Previously, there were booms in giving in Renaissance Europe, 18th-century Britain, the Victorian era, and during the age of industrialization in the 19th-century.
It is hardly surprising, considering how the number of millionaires has increased across the world. But inequality remains widespread. Besides the fact that giving makes one feel good for various reasons, it also makes business sense.
“Philanthropy in Africa, strateg-ically pursued, will contribute to broad-based growth, which creates markets, which in turn enables commerce. How could it not make good business sense?” says Jane Wales, who is the CEO of the Global Philanthropy Forum (GPF).
<div id="attachment_5881" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-5881" class="size-medium wp-image-5881" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/FWA-2013-Dec-Jan-024-026-CA-Phil-001-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" />Mona T Brooks |</div>
Besides opening up markets, many philanthropists are able to provide risk capital for social innovation where governments and businesses are averse to go. John D. Rockefeller, who was one of the first philanthropists in the United States (US), was key to helping eradicate yellow fever and hookworm.
A contemporary example is Eli Broad, whose Broad Foundation is sponsoring medical research in human genomics to revolutionize clinical medicine and make that knowledge freely available across the globe.
“Philanthropy is not and should not be about sure bets. It should include a very healthy dose of risk taking. In fact, in an era of 24-hour news cycles, snap judgments, and the tyranny of quarterly reports, one could argue that the philanthropic sector is the only societal actor that can take risks, withstand short-term setbacks and make long-term investments in the social good,” says Wales.
In the US, philanthropy and charities are encouraged through massive tax breaks. This is very different in Africa, where there is little legal framework for philanthropy. However, there is a push by philanthropic organizations, such as the Kenya Community Development Foundation, for governments to adopt policies that are favorable for philanthropy.
But what is philanthropy? The most common definition is that it is a humane act aimed at creating a better life. So how do we value human life?
Acclaimed philosopher Peter Singer believes that if we were forced to put a price tag on human life, we would say it is in the millions.
He then goes onto to argue that we are all created equal, “at least to the extent of denying that differences of sex, ethnicity, nationality and place of residence change the value of a human life”.
This is especially true for many Africans, who continue to live in abject poverty and survive on handouts.
But its not all doom and gloom. This picture is changing, albeit it painfully slowly in some areas. Philanthropy is gaining momentum in Africa, and it is not only international do-gooders who are helping communities uplift themselves in a sustainable way.
Africans are increasingly becoming involved in philanthropic projects, with the belief that we should be driving the broad-based growth on the continent.
In South Africa, the tax regime is slightly more beneficial. Currently, donations to public benefit organizations are deductible up to 10% of an individual’s taxable income in the year the donation is made.
But the South African Revenue Service (Sars) has noted that large donations are discouraged, because donations in excess of the limit cannot be carried over. It is now looking at allowing donations in excess of 10% of taxable income in any given year to be rolled over as allowable deductions in subsequent years.
According to Nedbank’s Giving Report II, which surveys the giving practices of high-net worth individuals in South Africa, respondents highlighted insufficient tax benefits as a reason for not being philanthropic.
“In 2012 a total of 29% of donors (104) said they would give more if there were more tax perks for giving. This is almost double the 15% of respondents in 2010 who said that changes to the tax regime would influence their giving behavior.”
The Private Philanthropy Circle (PPC), an independent forum of individual philanthropists, is in the process of preparing a formal submission to Sars and the National Treasury on amending the tax regime.
“We believe that tax legislation that promotes philanthropy through benefits or relief for the establishment and growth of philanthropic foundations (institutionalized giving) will ultimately encourage and ensure the sustained strategic support of civil society. Likewise, the non-profit sector would benefit from a more enabling environment for their donors a well,” says PPC member Amanda Bloch. The forum wants a number of changes, including an increase in the upper limit of 10%, the lengthy turnaround times at the Tax Exemption Unit to be addressed, and a clarification from Sars on gifts in kind and services donated, such as time, skill and effort.
Many types of philanthropy are practiced around the world and they all have varying benefits.
“Impact investing”, which aims to achieve financial and social environmental gain at the same time, is becoming more popular. Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft and one of the greatest philanthropists of our time, is an advocate for program-related investments (PRIs).
Instead of giving money away through grants, PRIs allow philanthropic foundations to make investments as loans or equity stakes, hoping to regain them at a later stage, plus a reasonable rate of return.
The Bill &amp; Melinda Gates Foundation’s $400 million investment program encourages employees to weigh up the social and financial returns involved in proposed projects.
In 2009, non-profit social investment fund Root Capital was chosen as the foundation’s first PRI. The organiz-ation is expanding opportunities for 500,000 rural households in Africa with an investment of $10 million and a $4 million grant. It is being used to extend access to credit, financial management training, and global market opportunities for small and growing rural businesses.
As privatization and the scramble for Africa’s mineral wealth continues, some philanthropic organizations and academics believe there are new opportunities to harness these resources for the public good.
Lester Salamon, a director at the Institute for Policy Studies at John Hopkins University in the US, argues for what he calls “Philanthropication thru Privatization (PtP)”. Basically, it is the phenomenon of capturing, in charitable endowments, at least some of the proceeds of the sales of state-owned enterprises or common-use resources underway around the world.
In one study, Salamon says that more than 500 endowed, independent charitable foundations have been created or enriched during the privatizations, and together they control assets of $128 billion.
The African Grantmakers Network believes PtP will help to prevent the continent’s civil society from relying solely on external funding. An example cited is the Newmont Ahafo Dev-elopment Foundation in Ghana. It was formed in 2008 when Newmont Ghana Gold Limited and the Ahafo Social Responsibility Forum pledged to support community development programs near the mine.
The company contributes $1 per ounce of gold produced and 1% of net profits from the mine to the foundation. In turn, the foundation supports economic empowerment, infrastructure development and sports and social amenities.
Becoming financially self-sufficient and not over reliant on aid and donors is not to be scoffed at. But just how many good deeds can be done when the overwhelming leitmotif of the initiative is driven by profit? Surely a case can be made that profit would, in most instances, trump philanthropy?
Whatever the method of benevolence, Africans are stressing that it needs to be sustainable. Earlier this year, GPF launched its most recent regional affiliate, the African Philanthropy Forum (APF).
Its aim is to contribute to the expansion of strategic philanthropy by Africans in Africa by seeking to address the underlying causes of a given problem. Put differently, don’t give a handout; give a hand up.
“But it would be a mistake to assume that strategic philanthropists ignore such inputs as instinct and intuition. It would also be a mistake to assume that deep in their hearts they are not in search of a ‘silver bullet’ that will solve all. It’s human nature to be impatient in one’s search for a better world. And that’s a good thing,” says Wales. APF’s members define philanthropy broadly to encompass all private means of financing the social good – from grants and microfinance to investments in enterprises that provide goods, services and income-generating opportunities for the poor. Some put their companies to the service of social goals, pursuing what is known as a ‘shared value’ or ‘inclusive business’ strategy.
APF believes the next wave of philanthropic innovation will come from the continent. The forum’s impressive membership includes Nigerians Tony Elumelu and Hakeem Belo-Osagie. Elumelu wants to rewrite Africa’s story by leveraging markets in a strategy he refers to as ‘Africacapitalism’, while Belo-Osagie supports a number of higher-education institutions and philanthropic funds to advance education and build leadership skills among young Africans.
Other members are South Africans Hylton and Wendy Appelbaum, who support a variety of causes, and Benin’s Angelique Kidjo, who promotes the empowerment of women and girls.
One of Africa’s most well-known couples involved in philanthropy is mining magnate Patrice Motsepe and his wife, Precious Moloi-Motsepe, who is a key player in Africa’s fashion industry. They made headlines earlier this year when they announced that they would donate half of their wealth to their foundation, which is involved in a number of initiatives to uplift communities.
The Motsepes join the likes of Gates and US business magnate Warren Buffet, who started the Giving Pledge, which encourages the super-rich to donate at least half of their wealth to charities.
Although the super-rich are often criticized that their philanthropic efforts are in part motivated by self-interest, their impact on making changes for good cannot be scoffed at.
As Albert Einstein so aptly put it: “It is every man’s obligation to put back into the world at least the equivalent of what he takes out of it.”

The value of philanthropy

Virtually all that stuff has to be dug out of the ground. Mined. Then manufactured, transported, sold and consumed.
First, it has to be found, where it hides, mostly deep underground. So, exploration companies with their massive machines, technology, geologists, agronomists, hydrologists, geophysicists and acoustical engineers flock to the Mining Indaba at Africa’s Southern tip. As do prospectors, who tell exploration companies where to look.
Then come the investigative drillers, reserve definers, junior miners and risk assessors, metals analysers, remote camp builders and computer software writers. Feeding at the edges, as always, are the lawyers.  Next come those who do actual mine construction. Here, the big boys get involved: banks, investors, partners, governments, fund managers, engineers, employment agencies. Lawyers move in. And we still have nothing tangible, nothing yet taken out of the ground to feed metals and minerals to a hungry populace.
<div id="attachment_1586" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-1586" class="size-medium wp-image-1586" src="/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/Minister_Shabangu-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" />Minister, Susan Shabangu</div>
Once gold, copper, coal, iron ore, bauxite and a hundred other elements surface from undergound, a new breed of people get involved, until the cars, jewellery, electricity or cellphone gets the stuff into consumer hands.
The extracted total of mining production is worth two trillion dollars, putting the worth of the whole industry and associated ones at about $2,000 trillion.
The Indaba itself? Probably worth $20 million. And its value to Cape Town? Ten times that.
There are 3,000 listed exploration and mining companies, half of them in Canada. The three deepest mines are in South Africa. Coal is easily the most valuable mined commodity, with 7,700 million tons a year worth an annual $693 billion. The next three are iron (2,000 million tons worth $238 billion), gold (257,000 tons worth $132 billion) and copper (16 million tons worth $122 billion). All these numbers from Chris Hinde of IntierraRMG, who ran “A three-hour PhD in Mining” at the 2013 Indaba.
Besides the 7,532 people registered for this year’s event, there were around that number again hanging around, often in suites near the venue, organising meetings with those who are registered.
One top chief executive of a mining company told me: “I don’t bother to go in anymore, otherwise I have to say ‘hi’ to a lot of people instead of just talking to the ones I need to meet. I take a room and get investors to see me privately.”
In the Cape Town International Convention Centre (CTICC) itself are hordes of people in black suits and red ties, anxious looking if they need money, urbane if they are investors or lawyers. Milling about, chatting, drinking, eating and of course networking.
Oh, and there are speeches as well. As a fraction of total delegates, the audience for scheduled addresses seldom exceeds half, which is still close to 4,000 listeners in the hall. Yet the talks are fascinating, especially the women this year. South Africa’s minister of mines, Susan Shabangu, tried to allay investors’ fears about real nationalization but failed to convince them that creeping resource nationalization in the form of taxes, labor laws, fees, licences, community demands and union demands were not a threat to investment. One mine owner muttered: “We’ve already been nationalized, we just didn’t notice it…”
Anglo American CEO, Cynthia Carroll, responded by telling the minister and her Cabinet colleagues: “Mining companies need to work in partnership with their employees and trade unions, to move on from conflict and to build positive relationships for the future. Partnership between business and government is also critical, particularly in ensuring that development objectives and initiatives are aligned. Partnership is essential. But it isn’t easy. Partnership is about dialogue—not monologue. It requires listening as well as talking. And above all it requires understanding and acceptance. Companies need to understand that in a vibrant democracy there will always be a lively political debate, in which not all the views expressed will be to the liking of business. In return, governments and political parties need to accept that business has an important role to play and a legitimate voice that deserves to be heard. Business is a partner, not a pariah.”
The third tough woman speaker was Mamphela Ramphele, who told delegates to be patient when asked if she was creating a new political party.
Her substantive address damned the current government by saying, to a ripple of laughter: “For the most, mining tax revenues vanish in the black hole that is the central fiscus and end up funding large rural estates for presidents.”
She took the audience on a tour of the key issues needing frank discussion if a viable and sustainable future for mining is to be forged. How do you build a mine to best share the resource? How do you deal with legacy issues to enable co-ownership of risk and reward? What needs to change to create sustainable economies and socio-political systems?
There were many speakers, each with platinum-plated wisdom to convey. It can get too much, so I took a tour of the 400 stalls in the exhibition center, mostly manned by Australians—who love Cape Town, seem to despise their government and see Africa as the future of mining globally.  Every single one told me they were happy to be at the Indaba ($12,500 per stand), would be back next year, and did not expect to do business but were there to collect leads for future business.
Jonathan Moore, MD of the Mining Indaba, said because it attracted investors and mining chief executives, it should probably not grow to be very much bigger as quality could suffer.
“It was started by a bright female entrepreneur, Sandy Lawrence, who realized when SA came out of apartheid there would be an opportunity. The first one only had about 200 people, but after it grew bigger she sold it to a private equity firm who held it for about five years, and Summit Business Media, based mostly in New York, bought it in 2007. She thought the intent of the event should be to drive foreign dollars into African mining.”
It has certainly done that.
“I bring 15 people from the USA but employ locals for PR, tech, IT, printing, signage, transport, bags, building stands, some 50 to 60 temps, security. We fill hotels, flights, restaurants, the CTICC, taxis, shops.”
“The CTICC is world-class, as are the staff. Everyone is happy to have it in Cape Town, and the city benefits big time. The world is still waking up to what this continent of Africa has to offer. The Indaba has moved in unison with that awakening and in a few decades things will be very different from now. We haven’t come close to tapping Africa’s mining resource.”
Levels of optimism are high, despite Marikana and the platinum recession. New finds everywhere, all bigger, better, richer, higher grade. Only the Australians seem unhappy, probably because they have to return to a depressed economy coupled with boring politicians.
Africa is on the move. Most of the stuff that has to be dug out of the ground, metals and minerals and increasingly oil and the gas, will come from Africa. Those who will reap the rewards of doing that are the people who people the corridors of the Mining Indaba. It is simply one of the world’s most successful conferences.

Tag: Governments

FORBES AFRICA SOCIAL MEDIA

From The Eye Of The Storm

YOU CAN GROW MONEY AFTER ALL

Get The Stone Out Of Your Shoe

The value of philanthropy

Digging For Profits