World Economic Forum launches new initiative for African biz start-ups

On August 27, the World Economic Forum declared the launch of a new initiative tiled "The Africa Growth Platform". The objective is to help the continent's community of start-up enterprises grow and compete in international markets.

The Africa Growth Platform by the World Economic Forum is likely to bring together the entrepreneurs, investors and governments to boost funding prospects and build a better enabling environment for business growth.

Initially, The Africa Growth Platform will secure the creation of a community of investors, foundations, multilateral institutions and corporate intrapreneurs to ensure the enabling process of better coordination and pooling of resources that could facilitate larger subsequent rounds of funding, as well as create and sustain a community of start-up businesses themselves, promoting collaboration and sharing best practices.

"Africa's entrepreneurs are its greatest economic asset but spirit and resourcefulness alone are not always enough to help them succeed. Too often start-ups and innovative enterprises fail needlessly through lack of additional finance or overly burdensome regulations," head of Africa at the World Economic Forum, Elsie Kanza said.

The requirement of this innovative approach is to assist the start-ups in Africa to reach a certain level where they become sustainable was backed up by data. Two-thirds of Africa's 420-million young people are currently unemployed which highlights a clear need for new solutions to drive employment growth.

The Africa growth platform will form a major part of the programme at the World Economic Forum on Africa in Cape Town between September 4 to 6.

With inputs from agencies.

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