The business industry in Africa has not always performed optimally compared to the rest of the world, more so in the sports sector. And when sports researchers sought to understand why, an intriguing if familiar picture emerged. The study, which involved 500 African players in the industry, found a poor understanding of sports issues, alluding to a striking lack of market awareness among businesses presumably already in the sector. It may, therefore, not be surprising that the entrepreneurs, as reported by Africa News Agency, struggled to convince sponsors and investors to fund their projects. The respondents, however, also lamented the lack of adequate data, including easy access to available data, saying it made it difficult to identify available business opportunities in the sports industry. Lack of adequate training for professionals in the industry was also cited among other issues affecting the African sports ecosystem. The findings sum up the cause for stunted growth of the sports industry, which commands a miniscule 0.5 per cent of the continent’s GDP, compared to 5 per cent it contributes to the global GDP, according to the Brookings Institute. In highlighting the issues, the findings inevitably also suggest the neglect of a long-acknowledged importance of a crucial industry. Recall that the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the African Union’s Agenda 2063, which inform many national development frameworks, remark the huge role sports can play in socioeconomic development. Yet, there are currently few, if any efforts to plug the knowledge and skills deficit that the stakeholders in the study lament. Neither, by the same token, are there readily available platforms to aid networking in their pursuit for investment and business partnerships. This is what makes the entrance of the SportsBiz Africa Forum (https://sportsbiz.africa) worth noting. The venture, a brainchild of the Rwanda Events Group, an events manager in the country’s meetings industry, aims to fill the gap by involving every stakeholder in the continent’s sports industry value chain, from the unrecognised talent and startup to the biggest global brand. Its inaugural conference will be held in September in Kigali and is set to be an annual event. And, inspired by the developmental aims of the SDGs and the AU Agenda 2063, the forum not only hopes to grow the industry but harness its contribution towards the continent’s socioeconomic development. A key plank of this ambition is job creation, which is hinged on the fact that 70 per cent of Africa’s population is under age 30. The demographic remains a reservoir of all shades of talent to develop and train, while also improving the professional skills of those already working in the industry. It is a sector that has long been ripe for plucking, and with business models to draw from global brands and federations such as FIFA in football and professional leagues like the US National Basket Association. Both are some of the biggest beneficiaries of African talent. But they are also some of the major international brands trying to give back with sports development initiatives on the continent—the NBA with the launch of the now thriving Basketball African League in 2019, and FIFA with the popular African Cup of Nations (AFCON). As a measure of the organisation's local economic impact, the forthcoming Kigali forum cites AFCON as an example. AFCON’s 2023 edition in Cote d'Ivoire is estimated to have created 50,000 jobs, primarily in the SME and informal sectors. Yet perhaps the more moral example about business and giving back that participants at the SportsBiz Africa Forum might draw from is the Olympics, whose games in Paris in August reminded us more directly of the state of our sports and the promise in African countries despite their performance. The games gave us all something to cheer about, even though only 12 African countries made themedal podium this year with a collective tally of 39 medals. It may surprise some to note that it has almost been the same countries contributing to a similar total number of the continent’s medals at every Olympiad. Still, aside from these numbers reminding us of the unequal distribution of talent within the continent and outside it, the Olympics were never so much about the medals as being part of something bigger. Almost every country in the world—over 200 nations, including all 54 African countries—participated in the games with the cost of each country’s participation subsidised by the International Olympics Committee, the organisers. This could only be possible because of the business acumen of the modern Olympiad, ploughing profit from a lucrative global industry back into the games in the service of its ideal to unite the world in a celebration of humanity’s potential—the same potential acknowledged in the SDGs and Agenda 2063.
