New Delhi, India (26 August 2024) – The Secretary-General, Manssour Bin Mussallam, accompanied by Dr. Shumete Gizaw, Under-Secretary-General for Technological Innovation and Digitalisation Enhancement (TIDE), attended the 19th Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) India Africa Business Conclave, under the theme “Creating ONE Future” in New Delhi on 21 and 22 August.
The Secretary-General delivered his principal address during the plenary session on “Leveraging Regional Production Network to Enhance Global Value Chains”, reflecting on the AAA approach of Indian business towards Africa – Affordable, Adaptable and Appropriate.
He focused, from the perspective of enhanced South-South cooperation and mutually beneficial partnerships of equals, on the imperative of ensuring high value-added industrialisation and accelerated regional integration:
“Regarding this session’s topic, we should ask ourselves: “what kind of production?” […] Our countries of the South have the aspiration not only to continue being exporters of raw and intemediary materials, but also to produce high value-added products […] This is applicable to cotton, to cacao, and [to countless other products], including critical minerals that exist within Southern soil that are necessary for the production of renewable energy technologies.”
In his conclusion, challenging the year’s theme, the Secretary-General stated: “I consider […] that we already have one future. The only question that we must ask ourselves, and to which we must provide an answer, and come together to realise, is: ‘What kind of future do we want?’” He then proceeded to argue that: “We need a future embodied by multilateralism of equality amongst parties […]; equity in our relations – where I, to be provocative, would say from each country according to their capacity, and to each country according to their need […]; and finally solidarity that is practiced horizontally, rather than charity that is practiced vertically, for charity is to give the leftovers, whilst solidarity is to share the meal, with a consciousness, an understanding that we share, above all, a community of destiny”.
About the India-Africa Business Conclave
Aimed at serving as an instrument for Africa’s growth and the role of India-Africa partnership in regional and global value chains integration, besides bilateral, trilateral, and regional discussions, the Conclave will focus on some of the key areas of partnership and emerging opportunities in Agriculture Food Processing, Defence, Digital Partnership, Financial Partnership, Healthcare Pharmaceuticals, Infrastructure, Power and Energy, Quality Ecosystem, Skill Capacity Development, and others.
