adsAs African governments seek fresh sources of funding for infrastructure and industrial growth, Adeyemi Aduwo, chief finance officer of Sunbeth Global Concepts, says attracting long-term capital will depend less on rhetoric and more on creating stable, investor-friendly economies. In this interview with BusinessDay’s Wasiu Alli, Aduwo explains why policy consistency, efficient institutions, and clearer economic priorities are essential to unlocking financing from institutional investors, development finance institutions, and the private sector. Excerpt:
In your view, what is the single biggest financial barrier holding back Africa’s economic transformation today, and why does it persist despite the continent’s abundant resources?
The biggest barrier is not the absence of resources, but the absence of long-term capital structured around Africa’s development realities. Most funding available to African businesses is short-term, expensive, and not aligned with the time required to build infrastructure, processing capacity, and industrial scale.
This persists because risk perception remains high, capital markets are still shallow in many countries, and a large portion of available capital flows into low-risk instruments rather than productive sectors. Africa has the resources, but the financing architecture needed to convert those resources into long-term economic value is still developing.
