Browsing: Prosper Africa

Africa is a budding continent. A resource-rich continent with a young population and one of the highest growth rates. The continent has a 1.2 billion large market and an increasing middle to upper-middle class. Conflict is not as prominent as yesteryear, and though still trudging slowly, democracy is on the rise on the continent. 

The continental focus is on strengthening trade, improving infrastructure, health, and building on the past decade’s growth towards Agenda 2063. A part of Africa’s expansion is partnering through trade initiatives to overshadow the legacy of aid.  

The United States has been a part of pushing this agenda forward. Holders of the top job in America have, in one way or the other created an Africa-specific program in infrastructure, health, and other developmental programs. Programs that extend beyond aid like AGOA and ProSper Africa proved to be a step in the right …

It looks like a Biden victory has for all intents and purposes been decided in the rather interesting election in the US elections 2020, which saw the largest voter turnout since 1990. The result of the elections stands to have a far-reaching effect on African economies and on South Africa in particular. 

Why is South Africa of consequence?

The US is one of South Africa’s largest export destinations with 2019 figures indicating exports to the USA valued at ZAR 89 billion ( USD5.7 billion) in iron and steel, precious metals, and mineral products among others. In terms of imports, the US commands a significant share of American imports, a figure that stood at ZAR 83 billion (USD5.3 billion) as of 2019.

South Africa is the second biggest gold producer and the largest procedure of minerals such as chrome, platinum, and vanadium. The country also has a significant agricultural sector …

Shelf Life is a revolutionary pharmaceutical inventory management subscription service launched in Abuja in 2017 and has expanded to Kenya. Within that time, through their business model of supplying pharmaceutical products to community-based outlets, it has received widespread acceptance.

The service, provided by social enterprise Field Intelligence, is active in 50 retail locations in Kenya, with over 500 life-saving medicines and essential products being supplied on a pay-as-you-sell basis. In Kenya, there are about 5,840 privately-owned community pharmacies licensed by the Pharmacy and Poisons Board, compared to approximately 4,700 government health facilities.

With the concept gaining popularity, Field Intelligence has been seeking to raise funds to expand to more shops both in Kenya and Nigeria. To this front, the company has announced the successful closing of its Series A funding of US$3.6 million equity.

The US$3.6 million equity raise will fund the scale-up of Shelf Life, the technology-enabled supply chain …