A head for business: Iman has run a successful cosmteics company since retiring from the catwalk

"The moment I got into the modeling industry, I knew I had to be an entrepreneur," says former supermodel Iman.

One of the most recognized models of the 1970s and '80s, Iman has used her entrepreneurial skills to great effect in the fashion industry, with her own cosmetics business and in her charitable fund-raising work.

Married to rock star David Bowie and now residing in New York, Iman was born in Somalia in 1955. Her father was an ambassador, but her comfortable upbringing was disrupted in 1969 with the assassination of Somalia's president, forcing her and her family to flee to Kenya.

"We left Somalia with nothing but the clothes on our back. Not even photographs, nothing. So it's a total loss of everything and a total loss of your own self, your own country, your own place in terms of your people. If you're lucky you're in a country that will give you a second chance," she told CNN.

She was lucky and her adopted home of Kenya provided her with a scholarship at Nairobi University, and it was also in the Kenyan capital that she was discovered as a model.

President Sharif Sheikh Ahmed

Sharif arrived in the Ethiopian capital on Friday to attend the "Saudi-East African Forum", a four-day gathering that aims to bolster trade partnerships between Riyadh and seven countries in the region.

"Piracy and terrorism have obstructed all kinds of development in Somalia, but there are mechanisms put in place to tackle these issues," he told the participants, which included government officials and representatives of 50 Saudi companies.

The Hargeisa livestock market is now booming with activity

HARGEISA - Days after Saudi Arabia lifted a nine-year ban on livestock imports from Somalia, the market in Hargeisa, Somaliland, has seen a 10-fold increase in sales, according to local traders.

"One thousand five hundred sheep used to be sold in the market before the recent announcement... compared to more than 16,000 animals in the market daily in the last few days," Jama Farah Du’alle, a middleman (`dilal’) in the market, told IRIN on 7 November.

Livestock keepers in the self-declared republic of Somaliland, whose mainstay is pastoralism, said they were beginning to see a change in their fortunes.

"In the last nine years I used to earn 5,000-10,000 Somaliland shillings a day [US $1.6 - 3.2] but by Allah’s mercy in the past few days I have been earning 60,000-70,000 a day, which has really improved my life," Du’alle said.

Somaliland’s livestock minister, Idiris Ibrahim Abdi, announced the Saudi move on 5 November. Imposed in late 2000, the ban followed an outbreak of Rift Valley Fever (RVF) in the Horn of Africa region.

Move marks the first major step towards electronic banking in the war-torn country.

Somalia's first ever debit card system has been launched.

Dahabshiil, the largest international money transfer business in the Horn of Africa, has launched an "eCash" service that will enable Somalis to pay for goods and services at participating vendors, gas stations, hotels and restaurants.

Analysts say providing Somalis with the ability to make and receive electronic payments has the potential to revolutionize the way money is transferred.

"It's a miracle, really just a major development," Bashir Goth, a Somali analyst, blogger and the editor of Awdal News, told The Media Line. "Remember this is a country that for the time being doesn't even have a banking system. Now suddenly people can have debit cards and within minutes Somalis overseas can send money home. It's amazing and will facilitate a lot of business."

The police and taxation department of South Africa have captured counterfeit materials belonging Somalis and Ethiopian businessmen in South Africa, witnesses told Shabelle radio on Thursday.

Reports from Cape Town said that the police forces attacked and started search operations at the shops belonging to the Somali and Ethiopian businessmen in Belvelle neighborhood in Cape Town where is the most populated areas of the Somalis there.

The South African government accused the Somali and Ethiopian businessmen for the selling fake materials from China in their business centers adding that they did not also pay any taxation of the government and reports indicate that the South African police forces forcibly robbed their materials and also took much money including more different belongings of the Somalis.

Paul Kagame is liked in the West because of achievements in Rwanda

Huge Chinese investment in African companies and infrastructure is helping Africa develop, Mr Kagame said.

Annual trade between China and Africa is now worth more than $100bn (£63bn).

Chinese companies are active across Africa, but have been criticised by some in the West, who accuse Beijing of failing to promote good governance.

Chinese firms, many of them state-owned, regularly bid for major construction projects at costs which Western firms cannot match.

Addis Ababa - Bollore Africa Logistics (SDV international), a French-based company, is close to striking a deal to manage Berbera Port, Capital has learnt. Eng.Ali Omer Mohamed, General Manager of Berbera Port Authority announced that a memorandum of understanding was signed between SDV representatives and port officials four months ago. He said: "We are looking at and dealing with this big French company in that regard." However, he also admitted that since the memorandum of understanding was signed there has been little progress.

SDV's agent in Addis Ababa did not have any comment on the issue. The Somaliland press said on 28 May, 2009 that a delegation of French officials arrived on a private jet in the Somaliland port city of Berbera for talks with the President of Somaliland Dahir Rayale Kahin and other senior officials who had travelled from the capital, Hargeissa.

The port manager told Capital that this French company was interested in investing in the port. According to the local media, Bollore was the first logistics network integrated in Africa and has over 200 agencies throughout the continent.

The continent’s largest economy will shrink 2.2 percent, compared with the 2.1 percent estimated on Sept. 10, the Washington-based lender said in its World Economic Outlook report today.

Demand for commodities collapsed last year, undermining growth in countries such as Zambia, Africa’s biggest copper producer, and Angola, the second-biggest oil producer on the continent. Investment into Africa has slumped, while donor aid may fall, worsening poverty on the continent, the IMF said.

“Donor countries, themselves mired in severe recessions, may reduce aid flows to the region with serious repercussions,” the IMF said. “Poverty could also increase significantly in the sub-Saharan region as real gross domestic product per capita contracts in 2009” and job losses increase.

The bid round now includes nine concession blocks comprised of more than 95,845 square kilometers of onshore and offshore areas. The deadline for final submission of bids is December 15, 2009 and concessions will be awarded on March 15, 2010.