Ghana's New Money

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The two communities are meeting at an interesting point in their respective histories. Since the U.S. civil rights movement, the black middle class has ballooned. The entrepreneurial spirit among African Americans is acute. In April, the Census Bureau reported that from 1997 to 2002, the number of black-owned businesses in the U.S. grew 45%.

Ghana is increasingly a target for foreign investment. It is democratic and relatively stable, a rarity in a region historically marked by thieving autocrats. In February, the World Bank named Ghana the friendliest country in West Africa to do business in. The country routinely attracts investment from the Netherlands, Malaysia and China. Overall, foreign direct investment in Ghana has more than tripled since 1998, from $45 million to $145 million. "The world is a global place," says Obetsebi-Lamptey. "We're not saying African-American investment instead of Chinese investment. We are saying African-American investment as well."

For those who invest in Ghana, the going can be rough. In 1993, Mona Boyd and her Ghanaian husband rented out their brownstone in Boston and moved to Ghana. They created Land Tours Ghana, a business specializing in guiding tourists through the country. Boyd, 55, now Land Tour's CEO, had visited Ghana before but had never done business in the country. She found that her go-go, type-A American personality was a poor fit with the laid-back spirit of most Ghanaians.

Still, Boyd worked 15-hour days and got a few breaks--when President Bill Clinton visited the country in 1998, Land Tours was contracted to show the presidential entourage around. Land Tours now has 52 employees and an Avis franchise. In the company's first year, Boyd's sales totaled $40,000. She brought in $1.3 million last year. Boyd says she'd like to help the new wave of African Americans looking to do business in Ghana. "If I had had someone to lead me through the process here, I think I would have had a lot less anxiety and stress," says Boyd. "If you are here with $50,000 and a business plan and put your nose to the grindstone, you will succeed."

For Idris Osei-Agyeman, 29, investing in Ghana was even more personal than for most African Americans because his father is Ghanaian. That side of Osei-Agyeman's family has worked as farmers for generations--a tradition broken only when his father emigrated to the U.S. to go to college on a track scholarship. Osei-Agyeman returned to the family last year, took out a 70-year land lease on 36 acres in Ghana's eastern region and converted it into a mango farm. "I wanted to go back on my own and get into farming, and when I ran the numbers, a mango farm seemed to be the best return," he says.

Osei-Agyeman still lives in his native Chicago, where he works in real estate investment, but two to three times a year he makes a monthlong visit to Ghana. On each trip he is sure to take a few African-American friends. "African Americans are coming from a nation that most developing nations are trying to emulate," says Osei-Agyeman.