Africa: Commercial Diplomacy Now ‘Core Focus of U.S. Engagement with Africa’

Monrovia — The Trump administration is adopting a new commercial diplomacy strategy for sub-Saharan Africa “based on what we’ve seen that actually works,” the acting head of the Africa Bureau at the U.S. State Department, Ambassador Troy Fitrell, said in a briefing on Tuesday.

“We have for decades been defined by an assistance-led paradigm, and we are very directly and very intentionally shifting that toward an investment-led strategy,” Fitrell told reporters following a week-long visit to West…