During this week's intra-African Trade Fair (IATF), multilateral financial institution African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) director and global head for trade finance Gwen Mwaba suggested that improved education was needed to address the intellectual property (IP) challenge in Africa.

“Africa has an abundance of ideas, but often does not convert them into viable and profitable businesses, resulting in lost IP.

"A plethora of good ideas are not followed-up. For those that are followed up, the good ideas are not sustained and the few good ideas that are followed-up and sustained are often not rigorously maintained,” she said.

She added that Africa needed more industrial development zones, built by the public sector, where the cost of production and manufacturing was reduced, and several countries could combine their industrial strengths to meet common goals.

“By leveraging innovative multi-country collaborative models, African countries can start to manufacture and export products to the rest of the world. Asia has done this successfully with brands such as Hyundai, whose vehicle components are manufactured and assembled by different entities, all working to leverage their individual capabilities,” Mwaba said.

Further, the kind of operating environment needed to allow Africa’s ideas to flourish and leverage the African Continental Free Trade Area free trade agreement was one where the political will of each country matched its potential to grow its manufacturing sector, said World Customs Organisation capacity building deputy director Ebenezer Tafili.

“The African Continental Free Trade Area needs political will to support its success, which requires collaborative private-public partnerships to ensure viability. Without a strategy to change policy and allow for more manufacturing and industrialisation, the notion that Africans are merely consumers and not producers will continue to exist,” he emphasised.