Project marketing to Africa: lessons from the case of IVO Transmission Engineering and Ghana’s national electrification scheme

There is a need for new models for foreign business and investment in Africa. The world’s “poorest” continent has a massive deficit in infrastructural, production and other facilities. The foreign business and investment dividends expected for economic liberalization and democracy that have been implemented by most African countries since the late 1980s are yet to be fully achieved. In this paper, project business is suggested as a model for foreign firms to do business in Africa, in the short to medium term. Thereby they will establish relationships and networks and gain valuable knowledge and experience of the African economies. Such experience, relationships and networks can be used to do profitable business in the short to medium term. In the long term, economic growth in the African economies will expand opportunities, and the firms in question will be well placed to take advantage of them.