Something is shifting across parts of Africa.

For generations, much of the world’s conversation about Africa has centered on what the continent possesses: minerals, agricultural land, natural resources and raw materials.

But increasingly, another question is entering the conversation:

What if more of the value could be created there too?

Morocco is giving us an interesting example.

The African Development Bank has approved a €100 million loan to Gotion Power Morocco toward the development of an integrated lithium-iron-phosphate battery giga factory in the Rabat-Salé-Kénitra region. The Bank also plans to help mobilize up to another €141 million from financial partners. 

Now, unless batteries and manufacturing are your field, words such as lithium-iron-phosphate and gigafactory can make this sound like a story meant only for engineers but the bigger idea is actually quite simple.

Morocco is building the capacity to make more of a valuable finished product.

And that’s where the story becomes interesting for the rest of us.

From Materials to Manufacturing

The factory is being developed by Gotion Power Morocco, a subsidiary of Chinese battery manufacturer Gotion High-Tech. Its first phase is expected to produce around 10 gigawatt-hours of battery cells and packs annually, particularly for electric vehicles, with plans to eventually expand capacity significantly. 

This isn’t intended to be merely a place where finished battery components arrive and somebody puts them together.

The project is designed to cover production from cathode materials through to battery cells. The African Development Bank expects more than 600 direct jobs in the first phase and says the project is targeting a 70% local industrial integration rate. That means we’re talking about more than a factory. We’re talking about knowledge, skills, employment, technology, supply chains and the development of industries around an industry.

So, What Is “The Shift”?

If you’re encountering this conversation for the first time, The Shift is how we’re describing something interesting happening across parts of Africa. It doesn’t mean Africa has suddenly become completely self-sufficient nor does it mean African countries no longer need international investment or partnerships. Morocco’s project itself demonstrates the opposite: it involves a Chinese company and international financing.

The shift is in the direction of the ambition. From simply extracting toward processing, importing toward manufacturing, possessing resources toward asking how greater value can be created from those resources and from participating in the global marketplace primarily as a buyer or supplier toward becoming more of a maker.

And Morocco’s battery factory is one more example worth watching.

But What Does Any of This Have to Do With the Caribbean?

Quite a lot, if we look beyond the batteries.

A small Caribbean nation does not need to look at Morocco and say:

“We need a billion-dollar gigafactory too.”

That would miss the lesson entirely.

Instead, perhaps our question should be:

What do we already have that we could do more with?

Our countries may be small, but small does not mean without resources, ideas or opportunities.

The Caribbean has agriculture, fisheries, sunshine, tourism and creative talent. We have food traditions, plants, fruits and agricultural products. We have entrepreneurs and also educated people, and across the region, there are problems waiting for somebody to build better solutions.

Perhaps our industrial future won’t always look like enormous factories.

Maybe it begins smaller.

A farmer stops selling only raw fruit and begins producing a finished food product.

Someone develops packaging that allows a Caribbean product to travel farther.

Agricultural waste becomes fertilizer, animal feed, fibre, fuel or another useful material.

A small company develops technology that helps farmers manage water more efficiently.

Researchers find a way to extend the usable life of locally produced foods.

One business becomes ten and ten businesses create a new sector then suddenly something that looked small begins contributing to an economy.

Small Countries Can Think Beyond Small Ideas

Being realistic about scale doesn’t require thinking small.

A country with a small population will naturally have different manufacturing possibilities from Morocco, China, the United States or India but perhaps regional cooperation changes the equation too.

Instead of asking whether every Caribbean island must manufacture everything for itself, we could also ask whether different islands could specialize, collaborate and trade more with one another.

One country may become particularly good at food processing, another at agricultural research, some at renewable-energy services and another at specialized manufacturing.

The point isn’t that these particular things must happen.

The point is to begin asking the question.

What could we become exceptionally good at producing? because there is a significant difference between having a resource and building an industry around that resource.

Perhaps That Is the Real Lesson From Morocco

Morocco’s factory will manufacture batteries but batteries aren’t really the reason we’re talking about it.

We’re talking about vision.

Somebody had to look at where the world was heading- electric vehicles, renewable energy, battery storage, and decide that Morocco should have a place somewhere inside that future.

Every country cannot manufacture everything.

Nor should it try.

But every country can ask:

Where in tomorrow’s economy could we participate more meaningfully than we do today?

And for smaller nations, including those of us in the Caribbean, perhaps the beginning doesn’t require billions.

It may begin with one agricultural product, a research project, a processing facility, an entrepreneur, one idea that somebody else considered too small to matter. 

Sometimes development begins long before the factory is built.

It begins when people start seeing differently what is already in their hands.

Food for Thought

What does your country already grow, produce, know or possess that could become more valuable if, instead of simply selling it as it is, we asked what else could be made from it?