Financial Transparency Coalition

Looking at 2012, experts from the Brookings Africa Growth Initiative (AGI) and colleagues from think tanks based in the region have come together to produce this year’s issue of Foresight Africa, where they outline the top priorities for the continent for 2012 and beyond. AGI scholars assess what they see as the major challenges for Africa in the coming year and provide policy recommendations on how to manage these challenges and leverage opportunities to catalyze and reignite growth in 2012. Similarly, AGI and its partner think tanks identify country-specific challenges in Nigeria, South Africa, Senegal and Kenya.

The resource curse is a tragic phenomenon that countries well-endowed with natural resources tend to have slower economic growth and poorer development than those without. This theory has been demonstrated very strongly in quantitative terms. According to an analysis of developing countries by Jeffrey Sachs and Andrew Warner, the more an economy relies on mineral wealth, the lower its growth rate. Countries with significant natural resource endowments also tend to have an increased likelihood of experiencing war and violence and a decreased likelihood of having a democratic system of governance. In January of 2011 the people of Southern Sudan—this also...

WASHINGTON, DC – Corruption, kickbacks and bribery are on the rise in Ethiopia, according to a forthcoming report from Global Financial Integrity, a Washington-based research and advocacy organization. According to the study, illicit financial flows out of the African nation nearly doubled to US$3.26 Billion in 2009 over the previous year, with corruption, kickbacks and bribery accounting for the vast majority of that increase.

An upcoming report by Global Financial Integrity finds that Ethiopia, which has a per-capita GDP of just US$365,lost US$11.7 billion to illicit financial outflows between 2000 and 2009. More worrying is that the study shows Ethiopia’s losses due to illicit capital flows are on the rise. In 2009, illicit money leaving the economy totaled US$3.26 billion, which is double the amount in each of the two previous years.