Sub-Saharan Africa (Report from the International Relations and Defence Committee)

Lord Lexden Excerpts

Wednesday 8th September 2021 Grand Committee

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My Lords, as the noble Lord, Lord Collins, said, this has been a wide-ranging and interesting debate. I am grateful to my noble friend Lady Anelay of St Johns for the way in which she opened the debate and for her great dedication as chair of your Lordships’ International Relations and Defence Committee. I am also grateful for her understanding, as a former Chief Whip, for the reasons for the delay in having this debate, as well as for the patience of all the committee’s members; I recognise that it has been tested. I am glad, however, that there have been opportunities during our many Statements, Questions and PNQs on the pandemic for some of the points raised in the debate to be made in your Lordships’ House.

The committee made several recommendations to the Government in its report. Many of them are already informing our approach to African countries as we tackle the pandemic and work towards a sustainable recovery. Africa is a continent of unequalled diversity. It is critical that we calibrate our engagement accordingly and focus our resources to ensure that we deliver the greatest possible impact for those with whom we work and for the UK taxpayer.

The Government’s vision for the UK in the world, including in relation to Africa, is set out in the integrated review. It highlighted our focus on east Africa and the continent’s regional powers, such as Nigeria, South Africa and Ghana, but we are also working to strengthen partnerships across the continent to boost trade, strengthen democracies and bolster security. Our overarching objective is to increase economic growth in African countries and support them becoming greener, healthier, more open and more secure.

To achieve this, we are focusing on five priority areas: economic growth; tackling threats; open societies; human development; and the shift towards a greener, cleaner planet. In the time available, I will say a bit about each of these priority areas. I will also try to address as many of the points made and answer as many of the questions posed by noble Lords as possible. As ever, I will of course consult the official record afterwards to ensure that all noble Lords’ points are properly followed up.

Our first priority is supporting economic growth to help African countries recover from the pandemic and meet the aspirations of their growing populations; as the noble Lord, Lord Anderson of Swansea, and my noble friends Lord Eccles and Lady Anelay noted, the number of people on the continent is doubling every 27 years. If African countries are to put themselves at the forefront of emerging global markets, economic growth needs not only to keep pace with but to consistently exceed population growth. That sounds ambitious—it is—but, as my noble friend Lady Fall mentioned, before the pandemic countries such as Ethiopia, Rwanda, Ghana, Benin and Côte d’Ivoire had growth rates of more than 7%. Those rates put them among the fastest-growing economies in the world. Fifteen other African countries grew at more than 5%. We want to help them to bounce back to those levels as quickly as possible.

As the Prime Minister reiterated at the Africa Investment Conference in January, our ambition is to be Africa’s investor of choice. These are competitive markets—as they should be—but we have much to offer and are working hard to increase trade and investment with and between African countries. We are supporting the African Continental Free Trade Area, as your Lordships’ report recommended, and strengthening our trade agreements; my noble friend Lady Anelay asked about that.

The African Continental Free Trade Area is the African Union’s most ambitious regional economic integration initiative and is a potential game-changer for Africa’s economic growth, driving industrialisation, jobs and prosperity. As well as delivering increased prosperity for Africa, if implemented fully, it could also generate new trade and investment opportunities for UK businesses, for example by reducing the complexity and cost for businesses of operating in multiple countries. That is why the UK is a strong supporter of it and why, on 3 September, my honourable friend the Minister for Africa, James Duddridge, signed a memorandum of understanding with the secretariat. The MoU is the first of its kind with a non-African country and will facilitate UK collaboration with the African Continental Free Trade Area across a number of areas, including investment and trade facilitation.

At the UK-Africa Investment Summit last year, we announced more than £15 billion of commercial deals between British companies and African partners. The summit was followed up earlier this year with the Africa Investment Conference, highlighting our goal significantly to increase trade and investment with the region, which your Lordships’ report recommended; the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, touched on this in his contribution. Supporting UK investment in Africa is a priority for Her Majesty’s Government. In 2019, using ONS statistics, UK investment stock was £50.6 billion —an increase on the previous year of almost 15%. Last year, when many investors in Africa were withdrawing, UK development finance committed more than £800 million of investment. To touch on the points made by my noble friend Lord Sarfraz, as others were withdrawing from Africa during the pandemic, the CDC Group stepped up to provide much-needed, impact-driven, targeted capital and liquidity to investment partners in the region.

In June, as G7 president, we committed the group’s leaders to working with their development finance institutions and multilateral partners to invest at least $80 billion in the private sector in Africa over the next five years.

The noble Baroness, Lady Blackstone, pressed for specific details about our trading arrangements. We have successfully signed nine agreements with 16 countries in Africa, representing bilateral trade worth £21.7 billion—

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Lexden) (Con)]

My Lords, there is a Division in the Chamber. The Committee will adjourn for five minutes.