This article studies the relationship between the foreign direct investment (FDI) and the industrialization. It examines the impact of the FDI on industrial performances in a sample comprising thirty nine African countries within the period extending from 1980 til 2015. The estimation technique hinges upon the generalized method of moments along with instrumentation of variables based on dynamic panel data. On the one hand, the results of different estimations proved that the FDI does not contribute to the industrialization of Africa. Contrarily, the latter has a positive and significant impact on added value by manufacturing integrating interaction variables. On the other hand, the FDI contribute significantly to the amelioration of the added value in the industrial sector. The positive and significant effect characterizes the five African regions in a distinct manner. This disparity is essentially due to the availability of natural resources and the difference in inter-regional economical and political structures. Based on the aforementioned results, it is advisable that African countries reinforce the FDI in favor of industrialization in order to assure an adequate structural transformation of the continent.

This paper attempts to determine the best way to maximize the contribution of agriculture to the growth and global modernization of Africa. By using middle-income African countries as a sample, this paper studies the effect of industrialization, human capital, economic opening and institutional quality on the value added by the agricultural sector. The quality of human capital exerts an accelerating effect of the agricultural value added. Indeed, the level of human capital determines the ability to use a technology or innovation capacity. The results require the establishment of appropriate institutional arrangements to overcome the constraints that agricultural products face in market and to turn capital and investment towards agriculture.