Can Foreign Firms Promote Local Production of Pharmaceuticals in Africa

African countries, particularly the smaller ones, suffer from various disadvantages that prevent local producers from serving a substantial proportion of their domestic markets for pharmaceuticals. How to take care of these disadvantages to promote local production and to reduce dependence on imports is an important political and economic issue in Africa today. Most of the countries with developed industries have used foreign investments and technology in the process of their development. Is a similar trend likely in Africa? Are foreign companies likely to invest there to undertake manufacturing of pharmaceuticals? Can they be induced to do so? The objective of this chapter is to understand the prospects for foreign direct investment (FDI) in the pharmaceutical industry in Sub-Saharan Africa, particularly in smaller countries such as Ghana.