November 20 has been decreed Africa Industrialization Day by the United Nations since 1989 - part of an attempt to mobilise the international community towards helping the continent build its economy.

But does Africa need to industrialize to develop?

Post - independence Africa was awash with elaborate schemes to make the continent self-reliant. However very few such initiatives remain today, owing to a mixture of mismanagement, poor planning and a lack of expertise.

So is industrialization still the answer or should Africa focus on a different route to development? Is Africa ready to fully industrialise? Should there be an industrial revolution in Africa?

Have your say.

Ofcourse,Some african nations are waaaaaaaaaay behind!!

But does Africa need to industrialize to develop?

Yes, Africa need to industrialize to develop. We were industrious before colonialism. The problem we have now is one of dis-orientation and psychological defeat.

The head is the glory of any human endeavor. When it is aligned correctly it navigates itself. Once in a while it might loose its tracking, but it soon regains bearing and self-corrects to gain ground. Its guidance is sought by lost ones trying to make it home before dark.

When the head is mis-aligned, it goes around in a circle and even though it is locked into a meaningless merry-go-round it in fact believes it is gaining ground. It never lifts its eyes up to behold the sun setting on the horizon, contrarily they are focused on the moving feet; that's the only measure of its progress as it dances in its own shadow. It must depend on an outer influence to help correct its gyroscope, which soon after anyway will return to that perplexed circular path.

Africans, we need to get our heads right.

So is industrialization still the answer or should Africa focus on a different route to development? Is Africa ready to fully industrialise? Should there be an industrial revolution in Africa?

Yes, we must industrialize. No, we are not ready. No, before industrial revolution we need cultural revolution.

Industry does not exist as a stand-alone of society. It must subsist on the people. The culture is the people. Industry is the web-network of intewoven connectivity that tie people together for commercial inter-dependency. So that whether you are exchanging commodities by trade by barter or by monetary cash or on credit, each partner in that exchange is formulating competition. When you compete then you improve. When you improve then you become better in your skills for comparative advantage. When you have the skills to increase your output then your productivity goes up. The more people there are with productive output then the community can experience growth and people become vested in the resulting cooperatives that will evolve.

There is no technology out of Europe, America, Russia, China. . . or anywhere else, but Africa has the minerals and resources to sustain it. The industries of the West subsist on the riches under our feet.

Liberia has rubber, Kenya has coffee, Sudan has gum arabic, Nigeria has oil, South Africa has diamond, Ghana has gold, Niger has uranium, . . .

We need to ask questions. . . we must query the options. . . is it possible that we could create an African trade board, a continental trade gateway?

Instead of independent trade treaties with isolated nations the West should come through the trade board for their needs. Each African country invested in the central output will make it more likely that as nations struggle to compete continentally for shared output and revenue then they focus more on what connects them together and less on what differences exist between them. The economy of scale will create benefits on many front.

We need to recalibrate the gyroscopes in our heads and break the cycle of dependency on the West to come and rescue us financially, if anything, they should be the ones begging Africa for concessions. We can do without their cellphones and cars and computers. . . in comparison, they cannot do without our cocoa, rubber, uranium, gum arabic, and everything else underneath our feet. It can be a healthy partnership between us and the West, a partnership of balance. But first we need to cultivate balance at home. The price of cocoa and diamond should not be dictated in Europe or America, it should be called by the African Continental Trade Board.

beyond industrialization, is there any other route to development?

Build an infrastructure first.

then we can talk about industry.

yes,industrialization is the key to africa joining the developed countries, if you look at china's history pre mao,it was worse than africa with the corruption,poverty,bad leadrship,tribalism untill the communist revolution and mao zedong's far reaching reforms even though he was a dictator,he also unified china and gave them a unity of purpose, china has followed his blue print and its clear to see how that has helped them to their present position in world finance/politics ,

infrastructure is part of industrialization!

SeanT21:

Ofcourse,Some african nations are waaaaaaaaaay behind!!

point of correction . . . . .all african nations are waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay behind