africa_dashboard.json…Can't load data file
This dashboard fetches its data from a JSON file alongside it. Browsers block local-file reads for security, so serve the folder with a one-line HTTP server.
- Open a terminal in the Dashboard/ folder.
- Run:
python -m http.server 8000 - Open:
http://localhost:8000/dashboard.html
The shortlist at a glance
All 54 African countries: 39 in the shortlist, 15 below the floor. Shaded by combined investment score (60% market attractiveness + 40% country feasibility). Pins mark Thirty Five's operating presence.
The opportunity map
Every African country is shaded by its combined investment score: deeper green = stronger case. Countries with imputed trade data (asterisk in tables) appear faded — treat their scores as directional. ● Orange circles mark countries where Thirty Five is actively operating. ● Amber circles mark countries where TF has intent / paper-stage activity only.
Top 10 — the shortlist
All countries that pass the gate (Attr ≥ 40 AND Feas ≥ 30), ranked by combined score. Countries marked * have imputed trade data — treat figures as directional.
Below the floor — excluded from the shortlist
Countries that don't clear the gate. Shown for full transparency — they were screened, not skipped.
Priority map — where to invest, by country and value chain
One table, the whole dashboard distilled. Every African country, its top opportunities across eight value-chain columns. Generated live from the scoring engine.
Priority map
Rows are the eight value chains. Columns are the gate-passed countries (Attractiveness ≥ floor AND Feasibility ≥ floor — adjust both on the Shortlist tab), ordered by total opportunity USD (lens-aware — see Strategic lens filter). Cells show the top opportunities in each chain × country. The icon next to each product carries two signals at once — shape: leaf = raw commodity, factory = processed form; color: red = substitute imports, green = expand exports. Click any country header to re-rank chains by that country's opportunity value.
Country profile
One country in depth. Use the tabs below to jump straight to what you care about — macro, trade, production, the operating environment, or where to actually invest.
The country at a glance
A 30-second read — the macro vitals, what the headline scores rest on, and the wider structural picture.
What feeds Attractiveness & Feasibility
The eleven ingredients behind the two headline scores — five for Attractiveness, six for Feasibility — each on a 0–100 scale against the 54-country African peer set.
Macro & structural snapshot
Background numbers that shape any thesis — economic structure, demand pull, external buffers. Latest available year per indicator.
What the country buys and sells
The food & ag flows in and out, broken down by chapter and by product, plus how much export upside is still on the table.
Imports vs exports — by HS2 chapter
Imports go left, exports go right. Where the bars are heavy on one side, that's where the structural opportunity sits.
Untapped export potential — by HS2 chapter
Green is what the country actually exports. Orange is the modelled five-year forward potential not yet captured. The bigger the orange bar, the more headroom.
Imports vs exports — by HS4 product
The same flows at four-digit product granularity — a sharper picture of where the volume actually concentrates. Filter by HS2 chapter to drill in.
Untapped export potential — by HS4 product
Where the export gap concentrates at the product level. The biggest orange bars are the most actionable line items. Filter by chapter to focus.
What the country grows and how well it feeds itself
The supply base on the ground, and how much of its own demand the country can meet from local production.
What the country actually grows and raises
Crops and livestock as a supply base. Sort by tonnage for volume staples (cassava, yams) or by farmgate value for cash crops (cocoa, coffee, cashew). Filter by HS chapter to drill in.
How well the country feeds itself — by category
Domestic production ÷ domestic supply, by FAO food category. Bars past 100% = surplus (export angle); below 100% = import gap (substitution angle).
What it takes to run a business here
Governance, political risk, business climate, and infrastructure — each ranked against the 54-country African peer set.
Governance profile
The six Worldwide Governance Indicators on the standard −2.5 (worst) to +2.5 (best) scale. The further out the shape, the better.
Recent conflict activity
Armed conflict (Battles) and insurgency (Explosions/Remote violence + Violence against civilians) in the last 12 months. Risk tier reflects absolute event count: Low ≤50 · Moderate 51–200 · Elevated 201–800 · High 800+.
How the country compares to its peers
Higher is better across every tile. Ranks are within the 54-country African peer set.
Top sectors to invest in
A ranked shortlist of the food & ag sectors most worth pursuing in this country — each row tagged with its strategic angle, the absolute dollar size of the opportunity, and a composite investability score. The chart's x-axis is production readiness: a 0–100 rating of how strong the country's existing supply base is for that sector versus its other food & ag chapters (higher = bigger producer relative to the country's own portfolio). The y-axis is total commercial scale: imports + current exports + untapped export gap — the full addressable-dollar size of the sector in this country, log-scaled.
The sector synthesis
Each row is one HS sector in this country. Four numbers — imports, exports, production, untapped export gap — combine into a score and a strategic angle. The score is normalized within this country, so it ranks priorities for this market; for cross-country deal sizing in absolute USD, use the Import Substitution and Export Expansion tabs.
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Substitute imports — country imports a lot AND has a credible way to substitute (either grows the raw locally, or processes imported raw in a real domestic factory). Replace foreign supply with local.
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Expand exports — country has a real production base AND meaningful exports (current or untapped). Back the exporter / close the gap.
The Size column reflects absolute USD scale: Large ≥ $500M · Medium $100M–$500M · Small < $100M.
Opportunities — ranked across all countries
Every tagged sector–country pair, sorted by total opportunity in USD (imports + untapped exports; current exports excluded — already realised). Unlike the per-country synthesis (which uses within-country log-ranks for relative prioritization), this view compares dollar opportunities head-to-head across the continent. Filter by country, product, size, or strategic angle to drill into the cross-country shortlist.
Filters
Only gate-eligible countries are included. Adjust the floor on the Overview tab. Attr ≥ 40 · Feas ≥ 30Cross-country opportunity table
Each row is one sector in one country. Ranked by total opportunity (imports + untapped exports — current exports excluded, they're already realised). Click any row to open that country's profile.
How the numbers are built
What the dashboard does?
- Every African country is scored on Attractiveness (size and dynamics of the food market) and Feasibility (how easy it is to operate there).
- The headline ranking combines them as 60% Attractiveness + 40% Feasibility. Market scale is already captured inside Attractiveness through Food market size, Untapped export potential, and Population size — so small markets are naturally placed where they belong without any extra multiplier.
- Inside each country, every product gets one of two angles: Substitute imports (substitute a real import flow with local production / processing) or Expand exports (back an exporter that still has room to grow).
- Only opportunities anchored to real local production or a real local processor survive — no greenfield-from-zero recommendations.
- Every borderline record was reviewed by hand and verified online to confirm a named operating company exists in the country.
Sources used
Slide a weight, click Apply, the whole dashboard re-ranks.
Governance, macro, infrastructure, and openness — how easy a country is to operate in.
Things to know before citing the numbers
Four points about the data. Each is also flagged inline where it matters.
1. Estimated trade figures · 13 countries
These countries didn't report their latest trade to UN Comtrade, so we estimated the numbers from partners or older reports. Treat the dollar values as approximate, not precise.
2. When official trade figures don't match what's actually happening
Three reasons the headline numbers can look different from what someone on the ground would describe:
- Informal trade is invisible. Anything that doesn't go through customs is missing — the Nigeria–Benin rice corridor, Horn of Africa livestock, Sahel cattle moving south, Lesotho–S. Africa bottled goods. The real volumes are larger than the official numbers say.
- Some "exports" are just transit. Goods passing through a country get counted as that country's exports. So Egypt shows up as a cocoa exporter (it grows none — it's Suez transit + Free-Zone repackaging), Djibouti's "imports" are mostly bound for Ethiopia, and W. African ports re-ship to Mali/BFA/Niger.
- Some big "import markets" aren't open to private investors. Where governments procure most of the imports through state agencies, the headline number is not the addressable market: Egypt wheat (GASC), Algeria cereals (OAIC), Morocco cereals (ONICL), Tunisia cereals & oils, Kenya maize (NCPB).
3. Estimated untapped-export potential · 12 countries
We don't have detailed export-potential data for these countries, so we used the African peer average instead. The "untapped exports" number is an estimate, not a measurement.
4. Currency devaluation makes US-dollar figures look smaller · 9 countries
These countries' currencies lost significant value during 2022–2024. The dollar trade numbers shown for them are smaller than the real demand — local-currency demand is largely unchanged.
5. Inferred substitute-imports opportunities · marked with i
Some product opportunities show a small i badge on the angle chip. These are inferred by the dashboard — the country grows the raw input AND imports a material volume of the processed form (≥ $10M) AND has no existing export track record, so the source build's export-evidence floor missed them. Classic case: Nigerian tomato paste — Nigeria grows 3.7M tonnes of fresh tomatoes and imports ~$16M of paste, but the country doesn't export paste yet, so the build script didn't tag it. Validate processing infrastructure on the ground.
Sources
- UN Comtrade · FAOSTAT · ITC Export Potential Map · World Bank WDI / WGI / B-READY · IMF WEO · AfDB AIDI · UNCTAD LSCI · Heritage Foundation · Credendo · ACLED