The richest man in Africa, Aliko Dangote, is ranked 9th on the list of the richest manufacturing billionaires in the world for 2023.
According to CEOWorld magazine, Dangote is the only African on the list, which is dominated by billionaires from Asia and Europe.
The 66-year-old millionaire, who made the majority of his fortune from his 85.2 percent interest in Dangote Cement, the largest cement maker in Sub-Saharan Africa, attributes much of his success to his maternal grandfather, who instilled a business ethic in him from an early age.
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According to CEOWorld magazine, the following are the top ten richest manufacturing billionaires in the world in 2023:
- Reinhold Wuerth & family: $25.7 billion
- Michael Hartono: $22.3 billion
- He Xiangjian & family: $21.2 billion
- Takemitsu Takizaki: $18.7 billion
- James Ratcliffe: $18.2 billion
- Goh Cheng Liang: $11.3 billion
- Li Shuirong: $10.9 billion
- Viktor Rashnikov: $10.5 billion
- Aliko Dangote: $10.5 billion
- Anthony Pratt: $9.8 billion
In the early 1980s, Dangote started his company with a small loan from his uncle. Since then, he has grown a sizable conglomerate with interests in the cement, sugar, flour, salt, and other sectors. The Dangote Group now operates in eleven African countries in a number of sectors, such as Dangote Sugar, Dangote Flour, and Dangote Cement.
Dangote described manufacturing as one of the most effective ways to lift people out of poverty through the creation of meaningful jobs in an online interview. The Nigerian millionaire said that countries less developed than Nigeria, such South Korea and Singapore, had average per capita GDPs of 31,846 dollars and 65,233 dollars, respectively, as a result of their level of industrialization.
“It is evident that manufacturing is pivotal to industrialisation. No country in the world has ever industrialised or attained ‘developed nation status’ without having a thriving manufacturing sector,” Dangote said. “Without a doubt, manufacturing is the heartbeat of industrialisation and the bedrock for inclusive economic growth and development,” BusinessDay reported in 2022.
