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The World Ahead | Africa in 2025

Africa will have some of the fastest-growing economies in the world in 2025

Several fast-growing economies show that not everyone is having a lost decade

A view of Mzimbasi Street, Dar-es Salam, Tanzania
Tanzania risingPhotograph: Panos
|LUANDA

By John McDermott, Chief Africa correspondent, The Economist

To walk around Luanda, Angola’s capital, is to tour a graveyard of another era. Half-finished or empty skyscrapers loom over the sun-kissed corniche. Some of the bars along the beach are gaudy monuments to when the price of oil was consistently above $100 and the elites partied in sub-Saharan Africa’s second-largest producer country. You can still see the odd bottle of Château Pétrus gathering dust on a supermarket shelf, a relic of a headier time.

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This article appeared in the Middle East & Africa section of the print edition of The World Ahead 2025 under the headline “A tale of two Africas”

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Illustration for the world ahead 2025 cover, a circle made up of squares featuring all the themes of the issue

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The World Ahead 2025

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Illustration for the world ahead 2025 cover, a circle made up of squares featuring all the themes of the issue

The World Ahead The World Ahead

The World Ahead 2025

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