In the Financial Times, Mo Ibrahim argues that while investment and good governance will ultimately solve Africa’s problems, “effective aid has an important role to play in the quest for sustainable economic growth and poverty reduction.” Ibrahim offers this assessment in light of the recent debate about aid in the wake of Dambisa Moyo’s book Dead Aid. Ibrahim argues for a “holistic approach to development in Africa that is centred on good governance.”

Excerpts below, full piece here

The critical argument should not be about aid or no aid – no one can question the necessity of pure humanitarian aid as long as it satisfies basic good governance criteria. The argument should be about where to focus aid to achieve the best returns for donor taxpayers and aid recipients. I propose two areas to focus aid: the hardware of Africa, infrastructure and regional integration; and human software, in the form of education and health.

The reality is that most African countries are sub-scale and fundamentally unable to compete in a global market. If economies the size of the UK, Germany and France find regional integration necessary to ensure growth, then 53 un-integrated African states have a competitive disadvantage. This fragmentation is evident in Africa’s transportation infrastructure, geared towards trade outside rather than within the continent. Africa needs to integrate its economies and open their borders to each other. Development aid can help these efforts and facilitate intra-African trade. This capital investment cannot succeed without investment in education and health.

Finally, while debate on development aid is of great importance, more of this energy should be spent on climate justice. Africans have emitted the least carbon per capita but will have to face the greatest consequences of its emission. A worthier use of the time of these great African and other economists is to devise a solution that allows the continent to meet the adaptation and mitigation costs of climate change.

-Chris Scott