Gregory Simpkins, a longtime specialist in African policy development, is the Principal of 21st Century Solutions. He consults with organizations on African policy issues generally, especially in relating to the U.S. Government. Mr. Simpkins manages a team of experts in various fields who are brought to bear in meeting client challenges.
He also serves as Managing Director for the Morganthau Stirling consulting firm, where he manages program development and implementation. He further acts as consultant to the African Merchants Association, where he advises the Association in its efforts to stimulate an increase in trade between several hundred African Diaspora small and medium enterprises and their African partners and helping Diaspora companies to develop business plans for their investments on the African continent.
Prior to retiring from government in early 2021, he served as Senior Advisor in the Africa Bureau at the U.S. Agency for International Development, focusing on trade, especially helping the agency assume operational management of the Presidential initiative Prosper Africa. He previously served as Staff Director for the U.S. House Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, Global Human Rights and International Organizations from 2011-2018, where he advised the Chairman on policy issues, arranged Congressional hearings, drafted legislation and led government oversight missions. He served on the same subcommittee from 1997-98 and from 2005-2006, during which time he helped pass the initial version of the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) and several subsequent versions. Mr. Simpkins also has served in a variety of positions in civil society, allowing him to help shape or implement U.S. policy on Africa. Such positions included Policy Director for the Corporate Council on Africa, where he developed positions on African commercial issues for an association of more than 200 U.S. companies doing business in Africa.
A journalist who has worked in national and local radio since 1977, Mr. Simpkins has covered such prestigious Washington assignments as the White House, Congress and the State Department. He has hosted talk shows and sports programs and has written for national and international magazines and newspapers, including the Christian Science Monitor, the Washington Times, Essence magazine, Jane’s Terrorism and Security Monitor, the Nairobi (Kenya) Law Monthly and The Guardian (Nigeria). He has written and edited several books and four newsletters on Angola. He managed U.S. government, national and international radio coverage for Sheridan Broadcasting Network. From 2009-2011 and since his retirement from the government in January 2021, Mr. Simpkins has written the blog Africa Rising 2010 (currently known as Africa Rising 21st Century https://africarising21stcentury.blogspot.com) and has conducted webinars on Africa issues.
Mr. Simpkins also has conducted training on accessing AGOA and helped develop public-private partnerships to promote trade and commercial development under AGOA in Nigeria, Senegal, Mali and Benin, as well as providing AGOA training for the African diplomatic corps in Washington, DC, and the African Women’s Entrepreneurship Program. He helped to establish the African Democracy Network, an organization of more than 200 African democracy supporters from 31 nations in 1994, and the AGOA Civil Society Network, a coalition of African NGOs concerned with the equitable implementation of AGOA in 2003. He also organized the Western Hemisphere African Diaspora Network, following a conference funded by the African Union in 2002, and established the U.S. Civil Society Coalition for African Trade and Investment in 2006.
He managed eight of the first 11 AGOA Civil Society Forums in the United States, Mauritius and Kenya. In recent years, he has enabled USAID to co-sponsor two Diaspora trade conferences in collaboration with the African Union Mission in Washington.
As a public speaker, Mr. Simpkins has given presentations on political and economic topics at the U.S. Foreign Service Institute, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, the American Countertrade Association, the Heritage Foundation and the African Studies Departments at the University of Pennsylvania, Johns Hopkins University, Columbia University and the University of California at Los Angeles. The Voice of America, the British Broadcasting Corporation and WorldNet’s “Africa Journal” program also have interviewed him on Africa issues.
He received his Bachelor of Arts in Journalism from George Washington University and his Masters of Business Administration, specializing in marketing, from the Keller Graduate School of Management.
For more on Mr. Simpkins’ views on U.S.-Africa trade, watch the following video: https://watch.africaprime.com/africa-prime-us-africa-relations-a-time-for-reset-gregory-simpkins-episode-7/.