Search Results for: Nigeria

BY WACHIRA KIGOTHI, IN NAIROBI, AND WANG FANGQING, IN SHANGHAI

China’s powerful clothing and textile industry is looking for continued growth in sub-Saharan Africa, whose local manufacturers and brands are worrying about how to deal with the competition.

According to William Gumede, a senior research fellow at the University of Witwatersrand’s school of public and development management in South Africa, Chinese domination of Africa’s textile markets and its industry has promoted significant job losses.…

BY DAVID HAYHURST, IN PARIS

THREE years ago, the Group of Twenty (G20) finance ministers and central bank governors stated the organisation’s intention was to "rationalise and phase out over the medium term inefficient fossil fuel subsidies that encourage wasteful consumption".…

IT is a curious irony that for an industry as technical as cogeneration that maybe the biggest handicap to its sustained growth in Europe is actually emotional. Both commercial markets and governments are swayed by sentiment as well as hard cash – and currently both influences are failing to pull in co-gen’s favour.…

BY MONIKA HANLEY, IN RIGA; ALICE TRUDELLE, IN WARSAW; CARMEN PAUN, IN BRUSSELS; EUGENE VOROTNIKOV, IN ST PETERSBURG; ROBERT STOKES, IN MALAGA; GERARD O’DWYER, IN HELSINKI; LEE ADENDOORF, IN LUCCA; ALAN OSBORN; MJ DESCHAMPS; AND KEITH NUTHALL

IT is a curious irony that for an industry as technical as cogeneration that maybe the biggest handicap to its sustained growth in Europe is actually emotional.…

BY MONIKA HANLEY, IN RIGA; ALICE TRUDELLE, IN WARSAW; CARMEN PAUN, IN BRUSSELS; EUGENE VOROTNIKOV, IN ST PETERSBURG; ROBERT STOKES, IN MALAGA; GERARD O’DWYER, IN HELSINKI; LEE ADENDOORF, IN LUCCA; ALAN OSBORN; MJ DESCHAMPS; AND KEITH NUTHALL

Such small plants have clear commercial applications and it could be – going forward – that market-based innovation, rather than government support, that will succour the sector in much of Europe during the ongoing financial and economic crisis.…

BY VILLEN ANGANAN, IN BEAU-BASSIN, MAURITIUS

INTERNATIONAL accounting firms are exploring opportunities within Africa, and are using the Indian Ocean island of Mauritius – a regional financial centre – as a stepping stone. All the Big Four: Ernst &Young, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), KPMG and Deloitte are already successfully offering their services to African clients.…

BY GEORGE STONE, IN CAPE TOWN

It is part of the accountancy profession’s faith that good honest financial reporting and dealings can promote economic growth because of the commercial trust that it engenders. And maybe nowhere can the case be made more strongly than in Africa.…

BY GEORGE STONE, IN CAPE TOWN

SUSTAINABLE growth in Africa outside South Africa faces the challenges of strong population growth, commodity price volatility, climate change and food insecurity. The continent’s current population of 1 billion people is forecast to almost double by 2050.…

DESPITE the killing of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan last May, Al Qaeda and its affiliated groups remain a global money laundering and terrorist financing concern. Yet a decade on from the September 11 attacks, counterterrorism specialists say there has been too much focus on Al Qaeda itself (it means The Base in Arabic) but not enough on associated and other militant groups that pose significant threats.…

BY WANG FANGQING IN SHANGHAI

A RECENT Chinese-African cotton agreement could usher in a new era for the African cotton industry but not in the short-term, say industry experts.

Under the agreement, signed in December with four key cotton-producing African countries – Benin, Mali, Chad and Burkina Faso (known as the C4) – China stated it would provide machinery, expertise and materials in a bid to increase and improve the quality of local production.…