Executive Summary
The Africa – US Business Conference & Awards 2026 is being organized and hosted by The Business Executive Communications Group in collaboration with the African Chamber of Trade and the International Business Council. The event is designed as a response to the growing trend of regionalism as platforms for executing international trade and investment, which have led to economic summits between Africa and counterparty regions such as the UK, the US, China and Russia. While such summits have primarily been government affairs, we have identified the need to create a platform that incorporates the participation of private enterprises and their owners and managers across the relevant counterparties.
The upcoming event is part of our ongoing series which cumulatively aims at promoting investment into African countries, enterprises and markets as well as facilitating trade between African countries and their enterprises on the one part and counterparty economies and institutions from the various other regions of the world.
The US has been making concerted efforts to increase trade and investment with Africa, particularly in the face of deliberate efforts from eastern hemisphere nations to woo African nations in order to win market share from the West. Meanwhile, even as African countries traditionally favour business relations with the West, the lure of economic support from the East is persuading African governments to nudge their enterprises towards Eastern countries and their enterprises. Importantly, the recently elected President Donald Trum administration in the US has announced its policy of focusing on trade with Africa rather than the provision of aid, which requires Africa to enhance its commercial relationships proposition, but also opens huge opportunities for African countries and their respective institutions and enterprises to take advantage of the biggest productive capacities, consumer markets, technological capabilities and investment capital, available within a single economic jurisdiction.
In order to defend and strengthen the traditional business relationships between Africa and the US – which is accompanied by demands for democratic governance, the rule of law, human rights and fiscal responsibility, transparency and accountability – we are organizing a ground breaking conference and accompanying awards to encourage, support and facilitate sharply increased trade and investment activity between investors, traders and enterprises in the US and participating counterparties from all around Africa on both bilateral and multilateral levels, the latter leveraging largely on the preferential trade and investment opportunities than the African Continental Free Trade Agreement has created for investors from counterparty countries all around the world. To do this the event will host a trade and investment facilitation conference to be participated in by individuals and representatives of enterprises/institutions identified as award winners because of their exemplary capacities, conduct, performance and impact with regards to trade and investment between Africa and the US; and carefully selected stakeholders in the promotion, facilitation and regulation of trade and investment relationships between the two. Special sessions during the conference will address the main initiatives being implemented by both counterparty regions to trade and invest in each other such as Africa’s AfCFTA and America’s African Growth and Opportunity Act; how they are evolving, and how their inherent opportunities can best be exploited.
This will provide an excellent platform for willing, capable and deserving enterprises and institutions to interact and connect with trade and investment counterparties and business support service providers operating in both regions of the world; as well as providing a platform for them to discuss the challenges of the trade and investment frameworks in both regions with regulatory and facilitation institutions and negotiate improvements in the frameworks for enhanced efficiency and business-friendliness.
The conference will be followed immediately in the evening with the awards conferment ceremony itself which will take the form of a five star gala event attracting the attendance of award winners and their guests/delegations, top tier bilateral and multilateral trade and investment promotion facilitation and regulation institutions, senior government functionaries, major direct and portfolio investors, entrepreneurs, corporate manager and captains of commerce engaged in trade and investment between Africa and the US as well as the international media.
Awardees will be selected from a wide field of nominees following an extensive, comprehensive and credible selection process using established selection criteria applied by our dedicated research consultants and ultimately our expert Awards Selection Jury through a quantitative scoring model derived from qualitative assessments of the set down criteria. Awardees will be given citations and plaques. Their participation in the conference and the awards conferment event that follows it will enable them meet, interact and forge mutually beneficial relationships with fellow participants in trade and investment activities between Africa and the US. They will also benefit from extensive positive media publicity generated from the event, which would consequently enhance their respective corporate/individual reputations and the degree and intensity of goodwill and concrete support they receive from the various stakeholder segments in their activities.