The U.S. and Kenya announced yesterday the initiation of bilateral free trade talks under the rules of the Trade Promotion Authority law. The U.S. wants it to be the first of several with African countries. Per the Legatum Institute, the African continent is the most prosperous it has ever been. Unlike Argentina, which is relatively poorer than in its past, each region in Africa is improving, even if at a slow pace. In part this is due to improved institutions and governance. While South Africa is the only semi-prosperous country south of the Sahara, at least six countries on the continent itself qualify as emerging, including Kenya. Mauritius is top ranked, but the island only has one million people. East Africa is outperforming oth...
Key Market Insights The broad market is locked in on this week’s Trump-Xi meeting in Beijing, but this is no longer just a trade summit. Increasingly, the meeting is becoming tied directly to Iran, energy security, and the growing global economic fallout from disruptions through the Strai...
From WPI Consulting
Illuminating the value of technical research
On behalf of a commodity producer organization, WPI evaluated the outputs from a project that featured a $5 million investment into technical research over multiple years. WPI’s team captured the results of this extensive effort and synthesized them for presentation to the organization’s governing board; among the findings uncovered and presented for the first time was the development of genomic traits proven, via rigorous testing, to provide crop yield advantages of 50 percent or more to U.S. farmers in times of drought. Capturing measurable results from long-term efforts can be challenging. Educating clients on the dynamics of success measurement when quantifiable results are not readily available requires deep client-consultant collaboration and an ability to consider both near- and long-term client aspirations with market/policy dynamics – attributes that WPI brings to every consulting engagement.