Aliko Dangote, Africa’s richest individual, ranks 6th among the world’s richest industrial billionaires.
Dangote, the founder of Dangote Cement, the largest cement maker in Sub-Saharan Africa, has a net worth of $14.3 billion and owns 85 percent of the company, according to Insidermonkey.com. He also established Dangote Fertilizer and Refinery, the world’s largest single-train refinery.
Last year, CEOWorld magazine ranked Dangote ninth among the world’s top ten manufacturing millionaires.
With a net worth of $10.5 billion at the time, he was the only African on the list, which was dominated by Asian and European billionaires.
Africa’s richest man is still the lone African among the top 25 billionaires worldwide.
Reinhold Wuerth is the richest man in the manufacturing industry, with a net worth of $35.3 billion. He Xiangjian, the second richest man in the manufacturing industry, has a net worth of $26.1 billion. Michael Hartono ranks third, with a net worth of $23.1 billion.
In an interview, Dangote described manufacturing as one of the most effective ways to bring people out of poverty by creating gainful work.
“It is clear that manufacturing is essential to industrialisation. “No country in the world has ever industrialised or achieved ‘developed nation status’ without having a thriving manufacturing sector,” Dangote stated.
According to the billionaire, countries smaller than Nigeria, such as Singapore and South Korea, have an average per capita GDP of 65,233 dollars and 31,846 dollars, respectively, due to their level of industrialization.
