[ARCHIVED CONTENT] 'Achieving Your Goals in Africa' event introduces UK companies to Africa’s potential

'Achieving Your Goals in Africa' event introduces UK companies to Africa’s potential

Highly successful UKTI pre-World Cup event brings experienced companies together with companies new to these markets.

With the eyes of the world on Africa in the run up to the football World Cup, it was the ideal time for UK Trade and Investment’s Africa team to highlight the opportunities Africa has to offer UK business. UK exports to Africa in goods alone were worth £7.8bn last year and many African economies continue to grow throughout the economic downturn. To link with the football theme UK Trade and Investment hosted its event at Wembley football stadium on 25th May 2010 to bring together country experts and businesses who are already successfully working in Africa with those thinking about how to begin or increase their business.

Over 200 delegates attended the event, which offered panel debate and round table discussions and UK Trade and Investment staff were on hand to help UK businesses in South Africa, Angola, Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Egypt, Sudan, Morocco, Tunisia, Libya and Algeria.

The presentations from this event are available at: //www.goalsinafrica.com/index.php

Export opportunities for your business

The event aimed to reach out to new companies so UK Trade and Investment was pleased to see 60 companies attending that had never been to a UK Trade and Investment event before and 41 companies who were new to doing business in Africa. As always, networking was uppermost in many people’s minds and the event was praised for bringing the right people together. Feedback from respondents estimated that the likely value from new orders gained from the Achieving your Goals in Africa event was between £50,000 and £2 million.

In his opening speech Sir Andrew Cahn noted that “The World Cup has the potential to do for South Africa what the Sydney Olympics did for Australia, but even more so with the potential benefits onward to the wider Africa, a modern and diversifying continent offering an increasing range of business opportunities” and whatever your starting point UK Trade and Investment offers a range of services to help business succeed.