Part II: The Doorway Is Visibility
September 03, (THEWILL) — One of Africa’s greatest economic paradoxes is that millions of people are working every day, yet much of their work remains invisible.
Across the continent, entrepreneurs are building businesses, serving customers, employing people, and creating value. Markets are busy. Shops are open. Farms are producing. Manufacturers are making goods. Innovation is happening.
Yet many of these same businesses cannot access affordable finance.
They cannot secure insurance.
They cannot win larger contracts.
They cannot grow as quickly as they should.
Not because they lack ambition.
Not because they lack capability.
But because the systems around them cannot fully see them.
Invisible businesses struggle to access visible capital. That may be one of the greatest barriers to Africa’s economic transformation.
We often describe Africa’s informal economy as a problem to be solved.
I see it differently.
It is evidence of extraordinary entrepreneurial energy.
The challenge is not that millions of Africans are building businesses.
The challenge is that too many of those businesses remain invisible to the systems designed to help them grow.
In the first essay of this series, I argued that trust is the foundation this architecture stands on. But trust rarely begins with belief alone. It begins with visibility. Before institutions can trust a business, they must first be able to understand it.
The Visibility Gap
When discussions about Africa’s economy take place, we often hear about a financing gap. I believe there is another gap that deserves just as much attention.
A visibility gap.
Across Africa, small and medium enterprises account for over ninety percent of businesses, yet access to finance remains a major barrier to their growth. A 2024 article published by MIT Sloan cited an estimated $331 billion SME financing gap in sub-Saharan Africa alone. Behind that figure are businesses with customers, revenue and ambition, but without the financing they need to grow.
This is often described as a financing problem. I believe it is first a visibility problem.
Imagine two entrepreneurs. One owns a growing manufacturing business in Nairobi. The other owns a similar business in Munich. Both have loyal customers. Both generate revenue. Both pay suppliers. Both employ people.
The difference is not necessarily the quality of their businesses. The difference is that one can easily demonstrate years of audited accounts, digital transaction histories, registered assets, tax records, and established credit history. The other may have built an equally resilient business but struggles to present that same story through systems recognised by lenders and investors.
Capital cannot finance what it cannot understand.
Not because it lacks resources. Because it lacks the language to read a business it cannot see.
Every business has two identities.
The first is the one its owner knows.
The second is the one the financial system can verify.
The gap between the two is where opportunity is often lost.
Visibility is economic identity.
A passport proves who you are. Economic identity proves what you can do.
And in modern economies, what can be verified is often more valuable than what can merely be claimed.
Visibility is not bureaucracy. Visibility is opportunity. You cannot finance what you cannot see.
The future of finance will depend less on collateral and more on credibility.
The most valuable businesses are not always the most visible. But the businesses that grow are almost always the ones that can be seen.
Formalisation Should Create Value
Too often, formalisation is presented as something governments want from businesses. That is the wrong starting point. Businesses should choose to formalise because the formal economy works better than the informal one.
Formalisation should open doors. To finance. To insurance. To export markets. To government procurement. To larger customers. To investment.
When entrepreneurs experience those benefits, participation becomes a rational business decision rather than a regulatory obligation. The objective should never be to make compliance more complicated. The objective should be to make opportunity more accessible.
I saw this early in my career in Nigeria. At Growing Businesses Foundation, we worked through microfinance institutions to expand access to finance for informal businesses. But the work was never only about providing capital. It also involved building capacity, strengthening processes and governance, and creating market linkages that gave businesses greater visibility and access to opportunity.
The same lesson held at SME Manager, where we supported investments in small businesses under Nigeria’s Small and Medium Industries Equity Investment Scheme. Capital was part of the answer, but businesses also needed the structures around it: sound processes and access to shared legal, accounting and professional expertise. The objective was not merely to fund businesses. It was to help them become businesses that could absorb capital, demonstrate credibility and grow.
Africa Has Already Built One Door
We have already seen what happens when systems create genuine value. Mobile money transformed financial inclusion across much of Africa because it solved a real problem. People did not adopt it because they were instructed to. They adopted it because it made life easier.
Every digital payment creates more than a transaction.
It creates evidence.
Evidence builds an economic identity.
Economic identity creates credibility.
Credibility builds trust.
Trust attracts capital.
Capital finances growth.
The next chapter is to ensure that these digital footprints become recognised financial histories. A business that consistently pays suppliers, receives customer payments, and manages cash responsibly is already demonstrating discipline. The financial system should learn how to recognise that discipline.
Technology Is Not the Destination
Africa’s digital revolution has been extraordinary. But technology alone does not transform economies.
Digital identity. Digital payments. Electronic invoicing. Credit histories. Business registries. These are not isolated innovations. Together, they form the doorway into a more productive economy.
Technology should not simply digitise transactions. It should digitise evidence. Because evidence is what allows trust to scale.
Building a Better Doorway
Making Africa’s invisible economy visible does not require starting from scratch. Many of the building blocks already exist. The next challenge is connecting them.
Imagine an entrepreneur who can register a business online in a single day. Receive a digital identity. Accept digital payments. Build a verified transaction history. Access affordable finance based on real business performance rather than traditional collateral alone. Purchase insurance. Compete for larger contracts. Pay taxes through a simple digital platform. Save into a pension.
This is not an impossible vision. Many of these systems already exist. Too often, they simply do not speak to one another.
Africa’s challenge is becoming less about building new systems and more about connecting the ones we already have.
The Doorway to Prosperity
For decades, we have asked how to bring more people into the formal economy. Perhaps the better question is different.
How do we build a formal economy worth joining?
People do not walk through a doorway because someone tells them to. They walk through because what lies on the other side is better. That is the challenge before us. Not simply to formalise Africa’s businesses. But to build systems that reward visibility with opportunity.
Visibility is not the destination. It is the beginning of participation.
Because visibility creates trust. Trust attracts capital. Capital finances productivity. And productivity transforms possibility into prosperity.
The first step into prosperity is not capital. It is being seen.
If visibility is the doorway, then everyone standing near it has a way to widen it. Here is where we begin.
The First Build
Governments
- Make formalisation worth choosing._
- Make business registration fast, digital, and affordable.
- Connect digital identity, taxation, and business registration into one seamless experience.
- Reward formal businesses with better access to procurement, finance, and public services.
Investors
- Reward visibility with capital, not just collateral._
- Expand credit assessment to include verified transaction histories, not just traditional collateral.
- Design lending and investment products that reflect how African businesses actually operate.
- Partner with fintechs and registries to improve visibility and reduce risk.
Business Leaders
- Build a business that can be seen.
- Keep accurate digital records from the beginning._
- Treat transparency as a competitive advantage, not a compliance burden.
- Build governance before growth demands it.
Individuals
- Choose visibility over invisibility._
- Build your reputation through consistency.
- Keep records that tell the story of your work.
- Remember that credibility is one of the most valuable assets you will ever own.
The Architecture of African Growth is a continuing series exploring how Africa can build the systems that transform potential into prosperity.
Next in The Architecture of African Growth: The Beams, and how domestic savings, pensions, and capital markets can finance Africa’s future.
The author, Dupe Olusola is the Founder & CEO of DOVA Capital, focused on energy and infrastructure across African markets. A former CEO of Transcorp Hotels Plc, she is a Harvard Advanced Leadership Initiative Fellow.
