The largest European Business Meeting, the BPIFrance Inno Generation for the BIG France Summit is seeking a strategic partners for French and International captains of industry in doing business in Ghana and the rest of the African continent.

In an interview with Joy Business on the sides of the BPI summit, Executive Director of BPI France in charge of exports, Pedro Novo, disclosed that a little above €1 billion euros have so far been invested in Ghanaian and African enterprises over the past two decades.

It can be recalled that BPIFfrance, in 2020 signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Ecobank Group, to support French exports to Africa by covering African buyers’ credit lines for an amount of up to €100 million.

“The appetite to invest in Africa is high. Each economy is introducing their version of competition.So you can imagine how spoilt for choice investors are. In Ghana, for example, a Memorandum of Understanding was signed by François Lefebvre, General Manager of BBIFfrance Assurance Export and Ibrahima Diouf, Managing Director at Ecobank International France to provide insurance to the tune of €100 million in order to support exports of French companies into Africa, by guaranteeing credit lines to be put in place in favor of African importers, directly or on an on-lending basis,” he stated.

Even as thousands of entrepreneurs world over, including some 500 businesses from Africa explore new business partnerships, Minister Delegate General for Entrepreneurship for the youth and women of Senegal, Papa Amadou Sarr, is concerned about the deficit in intra-Africa trade.

“It is of great concern that we barely meet each other as a continent to explore business partnerships and opportunities. My ministry is dealing with this issue in our own way. As I speak, we are exploring interlinks with Ghana to establish some ways of investing in the cocoa processing value chain. We are also exploring partnerships with Ghana’s buoyant SME and tech space,” he added.

The BPIFrance Inno Generation for the BIG France Summit saw 1,000 speakers make presentations concerning business creation, international relations and innovation – amid 400 workshops and conferences.