A debate has recently arisen on the subject of ‘Ethical Funding’ In the London office, so I thought I would provide some comment from the perspective of the African office.
As an ex-pat living and working here for some years now, one thing stands out with all these debates raging in the Northern Hemisphere and that is they simply have no comprehension of what the real world is like on the ground in these places not to mention what is really needed or how to go about it.
At the end of the day it all comes down to whether or not one has moral integrity themselves and in Africa this, in the main at least, is not the case. The reality is one of self enrichment and, preferably, not having to work for it.
There are those of course who do not think this way but they are very much the minority.
It is often said that the leaders of these nations are the ones at fault, but believe me when I say from personal experience, even those leaders such as Kabila in DRC, Khama in Botswana and Mswati in Swaziland are very much up against their own inherited establishment in making things happen in the right way.
We at alacratas have always designed our projects around a simple philosophy that if you empower the poorest this will develop the micro economy which in turn develops the macro and, in turn if you increase the standard of living of the poorest of society then the standard of living for the richest increases in proportion.
Translate this into the so called Global free market economy and all you see is the opposite; one of individual wanton greed and normally re-enforced by the media. Take the Oil price as an example, an entire Global economy based upon two ageing oil fields which combined, barely produce 2 super tankers a day in output, but hey, we will run out tomorrow – not….
We maintain our privately held status because the way in which we devise projects and account for the financing and socio economic impact over the longer term enables us to not only increase our income but also to provide a rapid increase in the standard of living across the board of developing nations but also to drastically decrease their input costs in the initial stages of a project to enable them to divert much needed funding to other complementary infrastructure projects and offset the costs over a longer period of time.
We also ensure we leave behind sustainable business we hand over to the locals who have been employed in that part of the project to continue running on a commercial basis after all else has finished. Visit www.bnbengineering.tk and you will see how we have put together the Angolan project on this very basis.
Before many of you reading this think ex-pat in Africa living in his mansion forget it, my late wife was Swazi, my children are Swazi not English and I live with the people in a modest house accessible by all who want to.
The foot note here is, ethics lye within the person and the collective people therefore determine the ethics of finance within the industry….