Africa as the next BRIC in the wall
Saturday, September 4, 2010 at 12:04AM 
FT op-ed by Jim O'Neill, chief economist of Goldman Sachs.
He says he is being asked whether his BRICs concept should recognize South Africa as the little "s."
He then notes that two of the "next 11" (another Goldman term) hail from Africa: Nigeria and Egypt.
So he explores the notion that Africa as a whole becomes a BRIC-level entity.
So O'Neill adds up the 11 biggest African economies and projects to 2050, saying a $13T economy is there for the making, leaving the African brick bigger than either Brazil or Russia in that timeframe, but not as big as India or China. Nearly half of that imagined GDP would come from Nigeria and Egypt, with South Africa naturally serving as globalization's gateway to the southern cone.
Piece ends with the usual bits about what needs improving for the scenario to unfold.
What's interesting, of course, is that we're even having this conversation about African pillars.
Another good reason why I say globalization is an amazing collective good.
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