West Africa is one of the business world’s last frontiers. Blessed with rich mineral deposits, fertile soil, and access to important waterways and ocean ports, the region has been an economic center for centuries, attracting ivory hunters, textile traders, miners, and metal craftsmen (see boxed insert, "A brief overview of West Africa").

Today, however, West Africa is among the globe’s poorest regions. Its 225 million inhabitants have a per capita income of less than $1,500 a year (even after adjustment for low local prices), roughly level with India’s and less than a tenth of Western levels. They have almost no mass-produced consumer goods and only four telephone lines and 40 television sets per 1,000 people, low even by the developing world’s standards. Half the population has no access to potable water, and infant mortality is almost 87 in 1,000. Even though the population is largely agrarian, daily calorific intake is 60 percent that of people in developed countries, and crop yields are a fraction of Western levels (see boxed insert, "Affluence and agricultural demand"). West Africa is barely able to feed itself.

Though the situation is dire, it is not without hope. There is a...