Opportunities and Publications

Binance, the World’s Leading Cryptocurrency Exchange Offers Courses in Africa

Starting on 31 Jan Binance Masterclass education series will provide tools and skills to build DApps on the Binance Smart Chain (BSC) network for 8 weeks under the theme Rebuilding Financial Systems on Blockchain. The Programme will be coordinated by crypto industry thought leaders from ChainIDE and Xend to Bundle and the BSC team.

Date and time: 31 January 2021, 4pm WAT, 5pm SAST, 6pm EAT; Location: Zoom (first 1 000 attendees) and YouTube; Register at: www.binance.com/en/event/masterclass_jan

New UNCTAD Report on Lesser Developed Countries (LDC) 

This report says that the broadening and full utilization of LDC productive capacities remains central to upgrade LDC economic structure. The increased digitalization of economies is reshaping global value chains. Advanced technologies offer ample scope for spillovers and productivity gains, but also risks deepening inequalities and technological divides. UNCTAD’s The Least Developed Countries Report 2020: Productive Capacities for the New Decade

Ecommerce Foundation Reports and 2021 Conference

We have included the Ecommerce Foundation’s reports as they have been published over last year. For those looking for this information, here are the 18 reports  of 2020, all of which zoom in on the state of ecommerce in the most prominent B2C markets around the world. The Foundation will also host the World Ecommerce Review, from 1 to 5 March with 15 webinars   Register

Africa Industrial Internet Programme (AIIP)

GE Africa and the Africa Leadership University have kicked-off of the 3rd cohort of the Africa Industrial Internet Programme (AIIP) which is aimed at equipping young Africans with skills that will enable them to take part in the 4IR. The 2020 cohort enrolled 35 students from 8 countries across Africa, drawn from Oil & gas, transportation, power, energy, manufacturing, healthcare, telecoms and aviation industries. Launched in 2018, the programme has empowered participants with essential skills for building applications for the Industrial Internet, which enables machine-to-machine communication and results in systems that can collect, analyze, and deliver data in real-time. Over the last 2 years, the programme has graduated 64 students, of which 50 were fully sponsored by GE from a $500,000 scholarship fund.

 New International Trade Centre’s report on online marketplaces in Africa 

The new International Trade Centre’s report analyses opportunities for online marketplaces in Africa.  Ecommerce is still nascent in Africa – the continent’s 631 online marketplaces recorded 2.17 billion visits in 2019, only 8% of the traffic on Amazon. Just 10 countries are responsible for 94% of all online visits in Africa, the report finds. Meanwhile, consumer traffic on online marketplaces in Africa actually reduced by 5% in 2017–19. “Business and policy insights: Mapping e-Marketplaces in Africa”.