Fashionomics

The rising tide of undocumented economic migrants from West Africa, the Horn of Africa, and other regions arriving on Europe’s shores is a wake-up call for the urgent need to create more jobs for youth, and for women.

The creative industries can offer a way forward. Creative industries in Africa offer massive potential for continent-wide job and gross domestic product (GDP) growth, which is projected to be up to 4.5pc in 2015 and to increase to five percent in 2016.

Textiles and clothing together represent the second-largest sector in developing countries after agriculture. In textiles and clothing, the largest percentage of the workforce is made up of women. What is more, there is great scope to hire more youth.

Numbers tell the story behind today’s tragic headlines. Every year, more than 11 million young Africans enter the labour force. While many African countries have been among the world’s fastest-growing economies, poverty levels and unemployment rates across the region have not fallen as much as expected. Youth unemployment in Africa is over 20pc.

More women than men work in low-paid, or under-valued jobs: in Sub-Saharan Africa, 74pc of women are more likely to work in the informal sector. Youth are also overrepresented in this sector. The labour-intensive aspect of the creative industries offers an opportunity to generate more skilled and unskilled jobs. It is also the sector in which modern technology can be adopted at a relatively low cost of investment.

Developing the creative industries, which comprise food, film, fashion and textiles, would draw on African culture as a unique selling point. To develop one of these areas, such as fashion, would mean that global and African brands, designers and manufacturers, and governments and development partners need to come together, to build global and regional supply chains across the continent.

This would in turn create new trade patterns for African economies. It is in this context, that the African Development Bank’s (AfDB) Office of the Special Envoy on Gender, recognizes the great importance of investing in the creative industries, specifically the African textile/fashion, food and film industries. To strengthen value chains in the textile and fashion sector, starting this year, the AfDB launched several initiatives: Fashionomics debuted during the AfDB Annual Meetings in May 2015. The event brought together fashion designers and development partners to talk about the challenges of securing financing to build up the sector.

Financing for Impact: Investing in a sustainable fashion value chain, a side event at the Third Financing for Development

Conference in Addis Abeba in July 2015, examined the catalytic role that official development assistance (ODA) plays in leveraging investment and building the fashion value chain.

Participants also highlighted the need for innovative financing mechanisms (including how to attract venture capital investment that can benefit women and youth) to provide incentives to grow the African fashion industry. On July 14, 2015, the AfDB’s Ethiopia Field Office hosted a discussion forum between donors, equity investors, fashion designers and manufacturers on the need for fresh approaches to scale up African design firms through entrepreneurship, training and skills development, and boosting access to finance and global markets.

Above all, developing the continent’s fashion industry and creative economies requires partners, governments and the private sector to work together. The AfDB can act as a catalyst in this process, by bringing these players to the table, because strengthening the fashion industry will take large amounts of public and private investment, at national and regional levels.

The AfDB has the instruments and the experience to crowd in these investments, by channeling funding through its regional operations, building up the capacities of local fashion firms, mobilising foreign direct investment, offering guarantees and providing funding to governments for regulatory reforms. Building up Africa’s creative industries will lead to a more sustainable and faster economic transformation, will give hope and livelihoods to Africa’s creative youth, and keep the talent at home.


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