Africa must use its expanding trade and investment relationships with Asia to build stronger domestic industries, create jobs and capture more value from its natural resources, rather than remaining largely an exporter of raw materials.

This was the message from Luvuyo Masinda, Chief Executive of Corporate and Investment Banking at Standard Bank Group, speaking at the Institute of International Finance (IIF) Annual Membership Meeting in Bangkok on Friday.

Participating in a panel examining Asia’s changing trade relationships, capital flows and economic connectivity with other regions, Masinda highlighted that in a more fragmented global economy, Africa needs to move from being a destination for capital to becoming a creator of global value.  “Africa has an opportunity to expand trade with Asia while extending regional and domestic processing capabilities, manufacturing and financial value,” he explained.

While China remains Africa’s largest Asian trading partner the continent’s economic relationships are broadening. India is becoming an increasingly important partner, with opportunities extending beyond traditional commodity exports into industrial development and infrastructure investment.

However, Africa’s reliance on commodity exports remains a significant challenge. According to UN Trade and Development (UNCTAD), primary goods accounted for 76.7% of Africa’s merchandise exports in 2025, highlighting the need to develop greater manufacturing and processing capacity.

To address this, Masinda pointed out that African countries need to take a more collaborative approach and leverage the scale of their combined markets to negotiate for investment that builds industries, rather than simply expanding extraction capacity. “African countries should negotiate at scale,” he said. “The African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) creates an opportunity to develop regional value chains, with different stages of production across various African economies rather than within individual countries.”

He highlighted Standard Bank’s support for Toyota Tsusho’s R1.1 billion automotive component manufacturing investment in KwaZulu-Natal as an example of what such collaboration can achieve. The project is localising the production of more than 100 previously imported vehicle components and creating more than 200 direct jobs. It has also facilitated skills transfer through engineers from Japan and Thailand.

According to Masinda, access to appropriate finance will always play a vital role in determining Africa’s ability to capitalise on these types of trade opportunities, pointing to the lingering annual trade finance gap on the continent which the African Development Bank’s most recent trade finance report estimated at between US$74 billion and US$92 billion as recently as 2024.

Masinda emphasised that addressing this gap requires more diversified sources of financing, including greater mobilisation of private capital and closer cooperation with development finance institutions. He outlined Standard Bank’s own initiatives in this regard, including scaling its direct trade volumes to the equivalent of more than US$1.2 billion and concluding a US$500 million Asia-focused sustainability-linked syndicated loan.

He emphasised that investment also needs to support the infrastructure and local businesses that allow African economies to participate more meaningfully in global supply chains. “We must move from financing flows of goods across our respective continents to financing productive value chains,” he said.

Looking ahead, Masinda emphasised the importance of economic integration and trade collaboration ultimately having a positive impact on the lives of Africans. “While these trade and investment partnerships need to ensure capital moves more efficiently between regions, the real measure of their success will be how well they connect people across those regions to opportunity through meaningful jobs, entrepreneurship, economic inclusion and sustainable livelihoods,” he concluded.