The richest blacks in the world

We are living at the intersection of many crossroads.  One such crossroad is  race and wealth.

One of the manifestations of which is Bloomberg’s Billionaires Index.   Which is exactly what it sounds like: an interactive exploration of the world’s richest folk.

The site is an interesting blend of design, functionality and content.  It is also interesting by what it omits – exploration by race or ethnic origin.  I tried to solve this in the long term by sending the Bloomberg team an email requesting this feature (no response yet).     But in the short term, I did some plain old research using Google, and then looked for the results (also published in Forbes) in the tool.

I’m not going to spoil the results.  I am going to let you enjoy using the site to satisfy your own curiosities.

But I can tell you that of the top 10 richest blacks in the world, I found one of them in the Index.   Lower down in the list than I had hoped.  Not someone I would have expected.  A man.  The second richest black is a woman.  She is not on the list since her wealth at almost 4 billion apparently does not make the cut.  Both their fortunes originate in and emanate from Africa.

It’s interesting to note how little we hear about Africa’s slow, steady and inexorable advancement as a world economic power.  It’s no wonder that many nations and businesses – Big oil, telecom, finance and the Chinese, have set their sights on Africa, and are investing heavily there.

Author: HarlemGuy

6 thoughts on “The richest blacks in the world

  1. hello, thanks for your work, i come to your site once in a while. please do not say that you do not hear much about the ‘slow’ growth in Africa. The net is the greatest knowledge resource and you can educate yourself on any topic, you have to direct the search. Billions of people all over the world know about how Africa has been growing VERY FAST over the past 15 years. Why do you think the Chinese and others have been doing business with us? The billionnaire Africans started appearing on lists over a decade ago.

    You and your fellow Americans are the ones that did not search for such information and even when it was mentioned to you, you ignored it because to you Africa is the ‘dark’ continent, full of spears and lions.

    Note that the Forbes list of billionnaires now has 9 black people, only Oprah Winfrey is from America, all the rest are from Africa, that is 8 BILLIONNAIRES. And they all made their money from industry – banking, telecommunications, cement, sugar, mining and retail. No entertainment or athletes. There are tons of other millionnaires coming up towards the billionnaire ranks.

    Educate yourself and stop saying that you are not aware of what the rest of the world knows. Go to youtube and see the videos on Aliko Dangote, Patrice Mostepe, Ovia, Folorunsho etc.

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