India and China in Emerging Africa: the new frontier for global trade?
The Rise of Africa by Professor Sanjay Peters
Globalization has revolutionized international business transactions over the past two decades. At the end of the first decade of the 21st century, the direction of capital flows have shifted from developing to industrially advanced countries. Much to the bewilderment of Western investors, Africa is the fastest growing region in the world after Asia, yet the perception, particularly those by investors from the West tends to be very negative about the region, barring of course wild animal safari trips for the privileged few and the excitement associated with the recent 2010 World Cup. No doubt that a sizeable portion of such negative stereotypes coincide with harsh realities in a number of Sub-Saharan African countries, taking into account that 34 out of the 53 countries in the region are regarded as among the least underdeveloped in the world. The image of Africa as conflict ridden however is being rapidly being replaced with a more dynamic and vibrant one.
Professor Sanjay Peters trained as an economist at California (BSc and MA) and the University of Cambridge UK (MPhil and PhD). In addition to having taught economics at a graduate level at Cambridge University (1998-2001), he has also worked as an economic advisor to the foreign office of the UK Government, consultant to the World Bank and the United Nations Development Programme. He serves on the Editorial Board of several scholarly journals and as an economic advisor to of a number of leading multinational companies.
Currently he is Director of the Center for Emerging Markets at IESE Business School and Visiting Professor at Asia Research Centre, Copenhagen Business School (2008-2011). Prior to joining IESE, he served as Associate Professor in the Department of Economics at ESADE Business School in Barcelona (2002-2008), Director of the China Executive Leadership Programme and Academic Director of the Executive MBA Programme at ISB in India, both on behalf of ESADE. His main area of specialisation, and hence publications in academic journals and books are on emerging markets risks and opportunities in Asia (primarily in India and China). He also carries out research work on the incentives for promoting growth and competitiveness within firms, entrepreneurship, analysing the determinants of macroeconomic growth, international economics, managerial economics, Neo-Coasian theories of the firm, measuring the impact of investments in human capital and institutional changes on economic growth.