Global Creative Summit urges investors to back Africa’s arts and culture boom

The Global Creative Summit has called on investors to pump resources into the sector to help create opportunities for musicians, filmmakers, and designers.

The calls come as the creative economy gains traction across the world.

The Global Creative Summit launched its inaugural gathering in November with expectations that African talent will continue to take the centre stage this year.

The second edition will be hosted in New Orleans in the US later this year, with talks already underway.

Founder Sinamandla Kwepile said the GCS is strategically designed to align with the G20's development agenda, mirroring its rotational legacy to ensure the creative sector is never left out of the global economic conversation.

Kwepile said it's about turning creativity into real economic opportunities through skills development, market access, and regional collaboration.

“So we call on investors to basically assist us with putting up these creative hubs where artists have access to the internet, access to information around policies, looking at what AI is doing right now. So, if we don't create our own AI policies and, as Africans, then the AI will take over the business for the creative sector.  So basically, we are calling out to financial institutions because  that is where we are struggling as creatives, how to sustain ourselves - how to make sure that the money that we make from the creative sector, we are able to manage it.”