Is Africa the new gold?

London, UK (African Rainbow Consulting) – Africa is home to around half of the world’s identified gold resources. That’s interesting, but not enough to make you wonder whether Africa’s time in the sun really has finally arrived. The real reason that savvy investors should be watching this space is this: the woman who provided the intellectual underwriting for gold’s return to favour is now promoting sustainable investment into Africa.

According to James E. Burton, former CEO of World Gold Council and CEO of CalPERS, one the world’s largest pension funds, prior to that, Katharine Pulvermacher “master-minded WGC’s communications strategy with respect to gold investment. She was responsible for a number of marketing initiatives that proved highly successful and was actively involved in the early stages of the project that led to the listing of exchange traded gold shares, notably SPDR® Gold Shares". Global gold ETFs are now worth more than US$ 44 billion.

Pulvermacher, who turned her attention to Africa two years ago, believes that the continent represents a great opportunity for investors to reap a triple bottom line.

She also believes that the best solution to chronic poverty is to create wealth by developing sustainable livelihoods. And what better way to do that than by investing in African businesses, especially those which employ the poor whilst providing them with much-needed services?

Pulvermacher is not alone. She collaborates with a growing network of individuals and organisations who believe in "trade not aid". Her innovation lies in creating a business that develops investors’ understanding of Africa while pulling in the funds needed to seed small African businesses.

Drawing on her experience of marketing gold investment, she argues that people do not invest in things they neither trust nor understand.

Ignorance and prejudice are key barriers to investment – especially in the case of Africa. Development finance institutions spend millions on building the capacity of recipient countries to absorb capital. Where is the effort to develop investors’ capacity to allocate capital efficiently?

"I hope that African Rainbow can help to fill that gap through our new training courses. There are significant opportunities that provide a win-win-win for all involved but they’re simply invisible if you don’t think outside the box," says Pulvermacher.

Does she have a point? If her track record in gold is anything to go by, most probably. Anyone attending African Rainbow’s new workshops on "Essential Africa" will have the opportunity to judge for themselves.

For more information about African Rainbow Consulting workshops, please visit www.africanrainbow.org or email training@africanrainbow.org.