I have just returned from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, where the summit of the African Union officially opened on Monday. The African Union, founded in 1963 as the Organization of African Unity, aims to promote co-operation among the independent nations of Africa.
Surprisingly, the world's media appears singularly uninterested in what's happening in Addis. It has given a brief nod to the conference in regard to Zimbabwe, an issue of crucial importance, but that is certainly not the only agenda item that should interest us.
The lack of attention given to the Africa Union summit stands in marked contrast to that being generated by another jamboree some 3,000 miles from Ethiopia's capital. In Davos, Switzerland, 2,500 of the world's top business leaders and politicians will be attending the World Economic Forum, which starts today.
The hype surrounding Davos, and the immense media coverage given to it, shows just how out of touch many of us are. The organisers modestly claim that the World Economic Forum could be 'one of the most important' annual meetings to date. The forum's 'theme' is appropriately 'shaping the post-crisis world.' The world's leaders will be taking stock of the economic crisis, and gathering ideas for tackling it, ironic given that many of them actually helped cause those problems in the first place. Instead of focusing on Davos, the attention of the world's leaders and media would be better directed on events in Addis Ababa.
Ethiopia's economic growth is truly remarkable. It is one of the fastest growing countries in Africa. According to The World in 2009 report, published by The Economist Intelligence Unit, in 2009, Ethiopia's economy is expected to grow at an extraordinary 7% and its GDP is predicted to reach $31 billion. Compare this with the UK where GDP fell by 1.5% in the last three months of 2008 after a 0.6% drop in the previous quarter. Or, the 0.3% GDP in the United States. The IMF has recently cut its 2009 world growth forecast to just 0.5 percent
The world's leaders could do worse than look to Africa. Indeed, it's quite possible that Africa will actually help pull the rest of us out of recession. The wealth of its resources and the improving political context in some of the Continent's biggest countries point to the fact that Africa will increasingly be a major driver of world economic growth not simply a dependent.
It's not only the economy where the future's African. The world is changing in other important respects too. Take religion.
Contrary to the secular prophets' predictions of its decline, religion will play a growing role in the development of the new world order. Despite the current focus on the growth of Islam, Christianity is growing at an exponential rate globally, and will continue to be the world’s biggest religion. It will, however, be a very different sort of Christianity by 2050 to that of the last 1,300 years. In The Next Christendom, Philip Jenkins observes that 'Over the past century... the centre of gravity in the Christian world has shifted inexorably southward, to Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Already today, the largest Christian communities on the planet are to be found in Africa and Latin America... This trend will continue apace in the coming years. Many of the fastest growing countries in the world are either predominantly Christian or else have very sizeable Christian minorities ... Christianity should enjoy a worldwide boom in the new century, but the vast majority of believers will be neither white nor European, nor Euro-American.'
In both economics and religion, it is time to end our outdated pre-occupation with European and European-derived civilisations. We should think carefully before talking about 'how the world is changing', especially from the cloisters of Davos. It's time, instead, to focus on Africa.
Paul Woolley is Director of Theos.
