For years, Western executives targeting African markets have blamed regulatory hurdles and trade red tape for their struggles. Yet according to Olu Abdulkareem, Senior Director at Anglia Xchange, the real issue isn’t the rules, it’s the execution. Drawing on two decades of navigating cross-border deals across Africa and Europe, Abdulkareem argues that while market access is easier than ever, Western firms consistently fall behind competitors from China, India, and the Gulf by neglecting the unglamorous fundamentals on the ground: finding credible local partners, understanding true routes to market, and building resilient relationships that survive when a deal goes off track.

“I’ve spent 20 years closing deals in Africa. The biggest mistake I see Western businesses make has nothing to do with the rules.

A few years ago, I got pulled into a deal that was already falling apart.

A European manufacturer had a multi-million-dollar contract in Central Africa, and the negotiations behind it had completely broken down. On paper, the deal made sense for everyone. In practice, trust between the two sides had collapsed, and the company was close to walking away from an agreement worth millions.

What saved it wasn’t a clause in the contract. It was going back to the people involved, working with the right government and diplomatic contacts, and staying in uncomfortable rooms until the relationship held again. The paperwork had never been the problem. The relationship was.

I think about that deal a lot, because it captures something I see over and over with Western businesses looking at Africa: they focus enormous energy on the parts that are actually the easiest to solve, and almost none on the part that determines whether they make money.

The access problem is basically solved. Nobody noticed.

This year, the UK changed the rules governing how goods can be sourced and processed across Africa. A new arrangement now covers 50 African countries, letting businesses combine sourcing and processing across multiple markets instead of being locked into one, while still keeping preferential access to the UK.

It’s a bigger deal than it sounds. For twenty years, one of the standard objections to doing business in Africa was that it’s 54 fragmented markets, too complicated to navigate as anything other than one country at a time. That objection just got measurably weaker.

And almost nobody I talk to in British business has noticed.

That’s not really a surprise. Rule changes are boring. Nobody built a career pitch around “the regional cumulation framework.” But the businesses that work out what it means early are going to have a real structural head start over the ones still waiting for Africa to feel less unfamiliar.

Access was never the hard part

Here’s what I think gets missed. Even now, with the rules easier, most of what determines whether a business succeeds in an African market has nothing to do with regulation.

A shipment still has to move. A local partner still has to actually deliver, and deliver the second and third time again. Someone has to know whom to call when a deal is at risk, because at some point, one always is.

I’ve watched companies with an excellent product, competitive pricing and real demand fail anyway, because they picked the wrong local partner, misjudged the route to market, or assumed the way they operate at home would simply transfer somewhere new. That’s not unique to Africa. It’s true of any unfamiliar market. The difference is that in a market you know well, you already have the relationships and infrastructure around you to absorb those mistakes. In a new one, you often don’t.

Meanwhile, competitors from China, India, Turkey and the Gulf states have spent two decades building exactly those relationships across the continent. A shared language or a historical connection doesn’t compete with someone who’s actually spent the time on the ground.

What actually works

The businesses I’ve seen succeed treat market entry as a sequence of unglamorous questions, answered properly, in order. Which market genuinely fits what you’re selling or sourcing. Who the credible local partners actually are, checked rather than assumed. What the contract does if something goes wrong. Who you call when it does.

None of that is exciting. A trade mission or a conference can open a door. It cannot build the relationship on the other side of it. That work happens afterwards, usually far from any headline, and it’s where businesses either build something that lasts or spend a lot of money finding out an opportunity on paper was never real.

ANGLIA XCHANGE was built around exactly that gap: helping businesses turn access into something that actually holds up once they’re trading.

The UK now has a wider route into Africa than it’s had in years. What happens next has very little to do with the rules, and everything to do with who’s willing to do the unglamorous work behind them.”

Olu Abdulkareem is Senior Director, Markets & Business Expansion at Anglia Xchange. He practised international law for more than 20 years, becoming a partner before moving into international business development across the oil and gas, steel and mining sectors. Throughout his career, he has worked on cross-border commercial projects involving governments, multinational companies and private investors across Africa and Europe. He founded Anglia Xchange to help British businesses expand into African markets through trusted local partnerships, sound commercial structures and practical on-the-ground support.