The 21st century is characterized by mass accessibility to information, often referred to as the democratization of information. In light of this, there is no reason why Africa should continue to remain at the bottom of the technological value chain.

China recently delivered its second ARJ21, a Chinese-manufactured regional aircraft. Last month, China launched its first narrow-body aircraft, the C919, which carried over 130 passengers from Shanghai to Beijing on its maiden flight. This plane is seen as a close competitor to the Boeing 787 and Airbus 320, two companies that have dominated the passenger aircraft manufacturing industry for decades.

During his recent visit to Washington, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi mentioned how India has partnered with the US to collaborate on the manufacture of aircraft engines with General Electric, semiconductors with Micron Technologies, and space exploration with Google, NASA, and even sending an Indian astronaut to the International Space Station.

These countries have achieved these milestones not because they possess more material resources or manpower than Africa, but because they are organized and have aggregated their populations and GDP. In fact, Africa’s GDP is larger than that of India, yet India has advanced technologically far beyond Africa, to the extent that Africa is now referred to as a partner in the India-Africa summit.

The failure in Africa lies in its inability to organize and leverage its points of strength, such as its vast material resources, aggregated GDP of $3.5 trillion USD, a huge population of 1.4 billion people, and its strategic location at the center of the world.

An organized Africa should be in a much better position to attract high-value investments. However, due to the distraction of heads of state with trivial pursuits and the division of the continent, high-value investors are not attracted to such a disorganized place but instead choose India.

Until the youth of this generation find a way to reclaim the continent from those determined to keep it in its current state, we will not be able to attract these investments. We need to reorganize the continent and harness the four points of strength I have mentioned: manufacturing electric cars, semiconductors, starting with light aircraft, railway rolling stock, and more.

This is the time to reorganize Africa so that we can stop missing out on high-value investments and instead attract them.