Sir Sam Jonah, a Ghanaian business mogul, has said Africa’s long-standing economic model of shipping out raw materials and importing finished products is virtually exporting jobs and importing unemployment.
According to Sam Jonah, African countries prioritising the sale of raw materials over local industrialisation are effectively exporting jobs and importing unemployment.
He challenged African leaders and the private sector must move beyond primary commodity exports and focus on producing finished goods that meet world needs.
Speaking at the launch of the Africa Trade Summit 2026 in Accra on Tuesday, November 18, Sir Sam Jonah stated, “For more than half a century, we have exported cocoa, gold, timber, oil, and bauxite. Yet the jobs, the technologies, the real value—those have been created elsewhere.
Every time we ship out raw materials and import finished products, we effectively export jobs and import unemployment. And we cannot industrialise if we continue feeding other nations’ factories instead of building our own”.
Sir Sam Jonah further stated that the transformation Africa needs will happen through business: through factories operating consistently, through entrepreneurs solving problems.
He added, “The transformation we seek will not happen in ministry conference rooms. It will not happen in communiqués, nor in reports that gather dust.
It happens—in the real world—through business: through factories operating consistently, through entrepreneurs solving problems, through investors taking long-term bets, through regional supply chains linking producers to markets.
That is why the private sector must be at the very centre of Africa’s industrial and trade transformation. Governments set the stage, yes. But it is the private sector that performs the play”.
In related news, Sir Sam Jonah has said that high-rise buildings in prime areas are being funded through dishonest sources.
According to Sam Jonah, vacant high-rise apartments in Accra’s affluent neighbourhoods—such as Airport Residential, Cantonments, and Labone are being funded with possible illicit financing.
He expressed serious concerns about the country’s booming luxury real estate market.
Sam Jonah highlighted that if high-rise buildings were funded through bank-backed loans, developers would be forced to rent or sell units quickly to service debts.
Speaking in an interview on Starr Chat with Bola Ray, Sir Sam Jonah explained, “If you walk around my area, Airport Residential, Cantonments or Labone, [look at] all the high-rise buildings going up. Everywhere in the world, developers go to the bank to take loans for those developments”.
“Some of these apartments are all empty. Do you think that if money were collected from banks, banks would not have moved in? What I’m saying is that they are being funded through sources which are not honest. Go around and ask, ‘Why are apartments empty? ’ If you had borrowed money, if you had gone to the bank to borrow money to build, you would ensure that those apartments are fully occupied.”
He added, “Ghanaian banks are not that well, and the balance sheets are not strong enough to give you patient capital to go and develop. The interest rates are just astronomical. You can hardly make it as a developer.”