As my colleague Mr. Roberts said, there needs to be a comprehensive policy on Africa, a policy that is inclusive.
In 2022, I went to Egypt at the invitation of the Egyptian government. Over there, we joked about how Egypt is referred to as part of the Middle East and is differentiated from the rest, when it is actually doing business with Africa. The same is true of Morocco. I stopped a moment to think about that. There we were, already looking at how we could divide up trade, instead of having a comprehensive policy to indicate first that this region is of interest to us.
So that is the first thing to do: We have to say that we are interested.
After indicating our interest, we have to determine what we need to do. We need to have a policy and dedicate resources to it. Our policy has to say clearly that economic development is very important. Certainly we must not abandon development programs, but there has to be economic development alongside them. The policy to be put in place must therefore be very clear.