Lamudi urges further investment in emerging markets

African Internet Holding’s online real-estate startup Lamudi has responded to warnings of slow growth in emerging markets, saying that selected emerging markets remained promising locations for business investment.

Founded in 2013, the real-estate marketplace offers sellers, buyers, landlords and renters a platform to find homes, land and commercial properties online. The startup covers areas such as Colombia, Indonesia, Kenya, Nigeria and Mexico, and has over one million monthly visitors from across around the world.

In a statement, Managing Director of Lamudi West and Central Africa, Allie Morse, reacted to recent reports that suggested under-performing growth in emerging markets. He said that while certain emerging economies were stagnating, others were not:

“Most of the analysis that downplays the significance of emerging markets makes the mistake of lumping all of the emerging markets into one group. Africa’s economic outlook for the next following years looks promising; according to Africa Economic Outlook its position confirms its strong resilience towards internal and external shocks to the market and its well-played role as a growth extremity. The set to be booming economy has been projected to accelerate its growth by 5.3% in 2014.”

According to the press release, Financial Times has asserted that emerging markets were “under-performing”, suggesting new locations for the focus of investment. However, Morse argued that although the BRIC markets were forecasting lower GDP growth than expected this year, this was not the case for other emerging markets such as Africa, which grew by 4.8% last year.

“Whilst no market is without risks and challenges, we firmly believe that investment in an emerging market such as Nigeria is here to stay. As a company, Lamudi will continue to remain as one of most promising locations for investment,” said Morse.