The t dynamic of region of a world that i can see right now. Thank you. You are modest in touting your commitment to increase another 5 billion of investment in africa. I want to thank you and applaud cocacolas leadership and the newhip with alliance for feud Food Security and nutrition. That is an effort many in this room have joined the United States and some of our partners internationally in supporting. Bringing opportunity and Food Security to people all over the continent, in particular to women and women farmers. Itight turn to you would be helpful for all of us to understand ibms experience and africa. Tell us about the environment you found, the opportunities you found. In particular, the innovation you have brought to the concept of smart cities in africa. Here, veryryone optimistic, not only about the present, but the future. We have had much discussion about the infrastructure and things like oil and gas. Of equal importance is the digital infrastructure. I challenge everyone to think and forrd resources this continent, the information will be the next Natural Resource. Like Natural Resources, you have to refine it. If you can, its returns are endless. This is the foundation for much of what we have been focused on. There, not quite as long. For many years, we were in eight countries. Like many others here today, over the next seven years, we will be investing at least 2 billion across these countries. I am very proud about that. As you look at the development, as many people said, i would offer a different twist on the lens of the opportunity. If you take a look, we talked about urbanization. If you are a business to business company, the opportunity is there are 52 cities over one million in population across the continent. There are over 400 businesses a billion dollars. We talked about the talent. I do not know why a company would not want to be part of growing and having that talent as part of their company, that will exceed china and india. The third point i would mention, the mobile infrastructure. X out of developed countries. As the conference started, i believe africa will be the place will leap frog and the solutions will be created in africa that will be brought to other parts of the world. That is incredibly important in how you approach the continent in many countries. The question about smarter cities, i would say we have taken two approaches. One has been if you look at her urbanization and you want a smarter city, we have done 200 projects across 10 countries and in many cases, where you said to bring people there and vice so you have twowait mentoring. Twoway mentoring. The other side, when you think about urbanization, the Foundation Industries have to be really strong. I wanted to take this , strong Government Services and retail, these are the things let me take the opportunity to announce that we formed an engagement and a partnership with Fidelity Bank in ghana. 100 million that we will work out with them. I would thank president mohamed for creating the rule of law and the climate for business, as for as the founder and ceo these vision about these companies. We are proud to announce the deal with the bank of ghana. It is almost 70 million. I would underscore what you can do, the opportunity that is there, i would latch on about the skills in developing the youth. I commend president obama and the team for the work that has been done. It is a public and private partnership. Is of my biggest learnings it is not about money. It is about developing capability. All of our efforts, we have opened a research lab. We only have 12 in the world. Education problems we offer our software in the cloud, free, to every university. We are training a thousand professors. They are the manufacturers of the future that will have to know the sciences and i. T. We have offered programs one is leading to africa. It is an amazing thought. Students, whos of are from africa, going to school and other countries of the world, and we have put them through internships for two years and they will go back and for, hopefully, for us, or some of you, but they will work across the continent. Africa andading to leading in africa. I am a believer that the contribution we can make is to develop those skills. Thank you so much. [applause] you have had a very distinguished and productive variousce investing in ways in africa, particularly in infrastructure. You have been a pie and nearing partner for which we are grateful. You have built airports. It would be helpful to hear your canpective on how we attract more in the way of foreign investments. Rolethe United States ought to milley role ought to be. Ago, if you try to put into a room, this type of people, and try to talk about africa, the conversation would be very different. Today, we are talking about business and returns. It is great. Coming next six years, you can imagine what that will mean for capital. The manner in which we would like to have capital. On a longterm basis, what it can be able to in hardd also investing assets. Infrastructure contributes to gdp. The whole competitive of the continent is dependent on improving the infrastructure. Is this chile initially, the challenge was to find capital. In our struggles, we were focused, whereby we could not get capital to commit to longterm funds. Initially, very smart capital. Our initial investors. Off with the first 15 year fund in the continent, to enable the type of investment to be able to take place. That thesis is proving itself , we can talk about africa in the sense that we are veryng about today, is a testament of this happening. Theres a lot of capital needed in the infrastructure. Few years, the story gets better and better. The assessment has been proven and had a chance to be made. Had two Pension Funds. We are happy to say, today, you funds. Ient pension we have seen a large reform with Pension Funds in nigeria, starting to invest in the infrastructure. I think it bodes very well for the continent. Those Pension Funds are not doing it because they are just african, but they are doing it for returns. Inasmuch as anything, they have pensions to which they have to look for look after in the future. They have to do the right thing. They do it for the returns. They get benefits after that. Thank you. [applause] we have a few minutes left. I wanted to spend the time that remains on a theme that everyone has touched on in one form or fashion. That is africas Human Capital. Without infrastructure, Everything Else is secondary. With that, africas potential is limitless. Each of you have emphasized that, and invested in real terms, to develop that Human Capital. Invite your to thoughts and comments in ways the United States, both private and government sectors might take our partnership to develop africas capital to another level, and to hear from our friends and colleagues in africa , what is our value added . How can we support africas development of its own Human Capital in an optimal way, and help in the creation of jobs for young people that will be skilled jobs for the future. Thank you. Used an interesting expression when he spoke of shared prosperity. Even as we talk of infrastructure, like power, it is important for us to always keep in mind that they are still millions of african children going to bed every night without a light. Even to read. There are simple things we can solarch as providing lantern so the children can read at night. There are simple things we can do right now building many minigrids because our villages will not receive power from these big power stations. Having a big powerline go over your village and because you build thousand megawatts for the city, when we can also look at how we can use solar power to so children can have access to those simple things. These are things we can do today. We can remove tariffs on things like solar lanterns. There are so many countries who one terrorists on tariffs Something Like a solar lantern. I encourage governments to strip such things away because the private sector can do such things for you today. Education is the key. We have got to get kids into school and to the extent that even the private sector, as we go into these countries, we must ofr in mind that is a piece our investment. It is not about your own workers. What can you do to get kids into not needven if you do them as employees . Thank you. Thank you. Thinked to add that i this is the opportunity of one of these ideas that would be a leapfrog, a grand challenge that could solve the big issue in africa and other parts of the world. And number of students to be educated is so large. I think working together, this grand challenge of taking what you might call massive, online open education elearning to a level of joint, public, private, we started work on this. The childsstand context, the behavior of their learning, you can breakthrough electronically with them on a scale that you can have no chance to do with teachers across the whole continent. This idea that we could have a great breakthrough on the grand challenge of elearning, coming out of africa, it is quite real and the basis of a publicprivate and number of different partnerships to advance that. Of h regards to the use is a global phenomenon. There is a need with regards to what other smart partnerships, in terms of investment, in social infrastructure, education. With the private sector, government can enable the growth in the education sector. New economy, investing that is what is needed. The type of skills we have now, we are not geared up for them. You need to be able to be competitive many years forward, it is going to lead that type of realignment. Thank you. One aspect is that we can help raise the confidence of youth in africa. That is a really important thing. Looked, 15 or 20 years ago, africa was not associated with positive things. War, strife, conflict. Today, i think there is confidence coming to the youth. What is the brand . It is a promise wellkept. That promises a vibrant future. We, in our world of communication, we created a piece of communication that said a billion reasons to believe in africa. 62nd piece of communication across every nation in africa. It produced enormous results what we looked at how it connected with people. And write to youtube billion reasons to believe in africa and you can see the 60 second, 90 second piece. They need to believe they can make a positive difference in this world that we live in today, which i believe they will. End. Is is a great place to i want to thank each of our and foror participating adding their wisdom and insight. More than that, i want to thank you for all that you are doing with and for the United StatesAfrica Partnership and helping take it to a new level. Event 10ook at this years from now, we will see it as an Inflection Point in our collaboration and our partnership, based on mutual interest and Mutual Respect. Inc. You all, very much. Thank you all, very much. [applause] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2014] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] the heads of 50 african countries meeting for three days of talk on u. S. Companies doing business on the african continent. 1 45 this afternoon, Vice President addresses the group. A discussiond by on issues impacting development. Secretary kerry will welcome the panel and charlie rose will moderate. Obama will close out the session with comments at 2 45 this afternoon. Announce 14d to billion in commitments by u. S. Businesses to invest in the continent of africa. We will have live coverage on cspan. That ak times reporting United StatesArmy Major General was killed today by an afghan soldier. He was shot at close range at a military Training Academy on the outskirts of kabul. He was the highestranking military the american to die in hostilities in the afghanistan war. We will hear more about that briefingin a pentagon shortly. Some tweets from a couple members of congress. Cook, a retired u. S. Marine who has visited afghanistan says my thoughts and prayers are with the victims and the families of those who were attacked at camp qargha earlier today in afghanistan. Mark meadows tweeting sad to hear reports of a two star American General killed in afghanistan, the highestranking to die in the conflict. We will learn more about the attacks when a pentagon when the pentagon holds a briefing. We will cover that live. John kerry spoke yesterday. The first day of the africa forum. It took place at the world bank headquarters. He called africa the new center of global growth. His comments are about 10 minutes. We will leave the event is the pentagon breaks in. Welcome to all of you here. We appreciate the substance of your comments and appreciate your comments on being your senator. This is an exciting week for us in washington. We are thrilled to welcome everybody here. This particular discussion and many others that will take place. To beg your indulgence at the beginning of my comments. I have to speak and run so to speak, because i have a series with so many president s in the city over the next three days, that i am beginning a marathon of meetings this morning, as well as trying to fit in the number of events that we have. I know you will understand that. Kim for hosting us here today. The things i admire most about dr. Kim, wherever he has been in his life, whatever leadership role he has served in, this is a man who has been willing to challenge the status quo. That was true when he found and finding new ways to provide care for hiv and aids at the world health organization. I did work with him on that. It was true when he balanced the budget and led dartmouth through its critical transition. We welcome his leadership. What i think many of you may not know is that when he was in high school, he was a quarterback. Those of you who know american football have to just imagine what it was like for this young guy about 10 years after he arrived in america. He was facing down big miss what big midwestern linebackers. There is no better preparation for todays world and life than that. A few decades later, he was revolutionizing how hiv and aids was going to be dealt with. I was in the senate. We were working then to try to find a way to create stronger trade links, particularly of Subsaharan Africa. Jim mcdermott, a former Foreign Service officer and member of congress at the time, we discussed Creative Ideas about how to break down barriers to trade, while at the same time lifting up the standards for governance and transparency. The result of those early efforts was the advocate africa of growth and opportunity act that president clinton signed into law in the last months of his presidency. For 14 years now, as Michael Fernwood said, this is the 13th meeting annually, but for 14 years ago has been one of the primary tools to push forward greater trade and investment in africa. It is working. We have seen imports from the agoa nations grow by 300 . Whether it is cocoa and cashews or petrochemical products, agoa has served as a catalyst for greater trade and prosperity and has helped promote greater protections for the african workforce. We do have some of our own interests on the line here, too. I say it up front. Agoa has made it possible for Ford Motor Company to export engines dutyfree from south africa, where ford has invested over 300 million so they can supply engines worldwide. The efficiencies of that operation have allowed for it to create 800 new jobs at their kansas city plant as part of the Global Production line. This is how it works. This is what africa is witnessing now. Something like 10 of the 15 fastestgrowing countries in the world are in africa. From day one of the white house, president obamas number one priority has been creating strong middle class jobs here at home, but the president has always understood that the best way to do that is to strengthen our International Economic ties and foster broad growth globally. Everybody here understands how interconnected we all are. Our populations are increasingly Walking Around with mobile devices. Everybody is connected to everybody every moment of the day. That is changing the way people think. It is changing their sense of possibilities and changing aspirations and changing realities of politics on the ground. President obama has said africa is a new center of global growth. Since 2000, banking assets have more than doubled. The Telecommunications Market has doubled since 2004 alone. We know that africa will have a larger workforce than india or china by 2040. It is time to get ahead of the curve. To invest in education. The increasing number of people who, because of todays interconnectedness, are demanding their part in the future. That is much of what is happening. It is young people that motivated and energized the initiatives initially, because of their sense of desire, frustration for the possibilities of the future. It is time to build a more open exchange of ideas. So it is time to build a more open exchange of ideas and information. That is part of the reason president obama had the idea for this ownership. To build our capacity for innovation. Agoa is one of the best tools, most vital tools for pushing forward the dramatic transformation we are seeing today in parts of africa. This is clearly a moment of opportunity for all africans. It is also, i say to you frankly, a moment of decision, because it is the decisions that are made, or the decisions that are deferred will ultimately determine whether africa mines the continents greatest Natural Resource of all, not platinum or gold or oil the talent, the capacity, and aspirations of its pe