Case Study: KPMG & the Millenium Cities Initiative
KPMG member firms, as part of its Global Development Initiative, are working to eradicate extreme poverty and aid in building sustainable enterprise to support the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals. Through MCI, KPMG delivers investment reports used to encourage foreign investment in developing cities in Sub-Saharan Africa.
The Opportunity
MCI’s initial focus is on investment frameworks and analysis that impact foreign direct investment (FDI) with the goal to create employment, stimulate domestic enterprise development and foster economic growth. In order to promote either local or FDI investment, MCI sought expertise in business due diligence for the Sub-Saharan locations identified as Millennium Cities. MCI assists the selected cities to formulate integrated city development strategies to stimulate economic growth and development. Whenever possible, MCI works with prospective businesses to establish supply chain linkages with nearby Millennium Villages.
KPMG’s Pro Bono Investment
Spearheaded by KPMG’s Global Transaction Services practice in 2007, KPMG’s work with MCI brings together KPMG professionals and member firms to provide pro bono reports, which are used by investors looking at commercially viable business opportunities in the regions surrounding the Millennium Cities. In 2008 and 2009, the program became operational with multi-dimensional aspects of skill-based volunteerism.
KPMG developed guides for investment opportunities, as well as deployed skilled individuals to drive results and promote activity based on recommendations in those guides. KPMG’s teams completed reports for Kumasi, Ghana; Kisumu, Kenya; State of Ondo, Nigeria; Blantyre, Malawi and industry specific investment opportunities. To read the reports, visit KPMG’s website
The Impact
The reports on cities in Kenya, Ghana, Nigeria and Malawi will be used to encourage foreign investment that will lift the local economy, and provide foundational information to assist the MCI in developing proposals for investment promotion and economic growth. Member firms in Ghana, India, Kenya, Malawi, Netherlands, Nigeria, United Kingdom and the United States have been engaged with the MCI to support the delivery of the reports. KPMG in the United States donated a year secondment to the MCI headquarters in New York to assist with city investment development efforts and provide coordination and development of other KPMG pro-bono support work.
For Jim Geisel, Advisory Director from KPMG’s U.S. firm, the city investment reports provide the specific intelligence needed to facilitate investment. “We also examine the business environment, how investors can work within it, and how it can be made more hospitable,” he says. “There is significant opportunity in sub-Saharan Africa; the question is how to tap it. Our goal is to leave in place self-sustaining engines of economic growth.”
About the Millennium Cities Initiative
The Millennium Cities Initiative (MCI), an urban counterpart to the Millennium Villages Project, is assisting selected mid-sized cities across sub-Saharan Africa with investment promotion supporting their efforts to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The project, led by Professor Jeffrey Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute and special advisor to the Secretary General of the United Nations, is part of a broad set of initiatives designed to accelerate progress toward achieving the Millennium Development Goals – a set of eight time-bound targets that comprise a thorough approach to ending dire poverty. The MCI is currently operating in nine locations in seven countries.
About KPMG LLP
KPMG LLP, the audit, tax and advisory firm (www.us.kpmg.com) is the U.S. member firm of KPMG International, a Swiss cooperative. KPMG member firms have 137,000 professionals working in 144 countries. KPMG intends to pioneer a model of excellence in corporate engagement and manifest KPMG’s commitment to communities on a truly global scale.
