US$286 Million in African Music Royalties Goes Missing Every Year
AFRICA · CULTURE
Key Facts
—The gap: An estimated US$286 million in recorded music revenue goes uncollected every year in Kenya and Nigeria alone.
—The programme: The United States has launched a year-long initiative called IP for Growth, aimed at African creators and especially musicians.
—Where it runs: It began in Geneva and has moved to workshops in Lagos and Johannesburg, bringing together artists, producers, lawyers and officials.
—The ask: Washington is urging African governments to ratify and implement two WIPO treaties covering digital distribution and streaming.
—The market: Sub-Saharan African music markets have grown by double digits for five consecutive years, according to the industry federation IFPI.
—The close: The initiative is due to conclude in December at a WIPO meeting in Geneva.
African music royalties worth about US$286 million go uncollected each year in Kenya and Nigeria alone, and a new American programme is trying to change that. It is training artists, lawyers and officials in how rights are registered, tracked and paid.
Where African music royalties go missing
The estimate comes from the Music Economy Development Initiative, a research partnership between the Center for Music Ecosystems and the campaign group Global Citizen, and it covers only two countries. It measures money that is genuinely earned, then never reaches the person who made the recording.
The losses accumulate in ordinary places. Radio play goes unlogged, streaming metadata is incomplete, live performance is unreported, and collecting societies lack the systems to match a payment to a rights holder.
None of this is exotic. It is the same administrative plumbing that took decades to build in Europe and North America, and it is largely absent across much of the continent.
The gap is not a measure of piracy alone. It counts legitimate plays on licensed platforms and stations where the money simply fails to find its owner.
The scale is striking. Sub-Saharan Africa’s entire recorded music market generated about US$120 million in 2025, according to IFPI — less than half of what Kenya and Nigeria alone are projected to lose each year.
What the programme actually does
The initiative is called IP for Growth and runs for a year. It was announced at a briefing hosted by the US State Department’s Africa Regional Media Hub.
Katherine Hiner, the intellectual property attaché for sub-Saharan Africa at the US Patent and Trademark Office, is leading it. Based in Johannesburg, she is the first attaché the office has ever posted to the region.
Her description of the aim is simple. It is to move the conversation “from the multilateral space to the creators and policymakers doing the hard work on the ground.”
The programme began in Geneva and has since run workshops in Lagos and Johannesburg. It is scheduled to conclude in December at a WIPO gathering back in Geneva.
The treaties, and the argument for signing them
Hiner urged African governments to ratify and implement the WIPO Copyright Treaty and the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty. Both were written to extend protection to digital distribution, streaming and downloads.
Her other priorities were more practical: strengthening collective management organisations, making royalty collection transparent, and enforcing against piracy. Those are the bodies that actually move money to artists.
She also addressed artificial intelligence, saying copyright remains central to protecting creators. Doctrines such as fair use, she argued, can balance innovation against the rights of the people whose work trains the systems.
Why this is a business story, not only a cultural one
“Music isn’t just a mood or a vibe. It is a business,” Hiner said. Afrobeats has become one of Nigeria’s most visible exports, and Sub-Saharan music markets have grown by double digits for five straight years according to IFPI.
A catalogue is only an asset if the income attached to it can be traced and enforced. Where collection is weak, the value stays theoretical however large the audience becomes.
Latin America went through a version of this. Brazilian and Colombian music built global audiences well before the region’s royalty infrastructure caught up, and the gap cost a generation of musicians real money.
Publishing catalogues have become a recognised asset class, with pension funds and specialist buyers paying large sums for reliable royalty streams. That market has barely touched African repertoire.
Who actually collects the money
Collective management organisations sit at the centre of the system. They license music to broadcasters and venues, gather the fees and distribute them to writers and performers.
Across much of Africa these bodies are underfunded, and several have faced governance disputes that stalled payments for years. Where the society is weak, the money either never arrives or never leaves.
Streaming has changed the arithmetic without solving the problem. A song can be played millions of times abroad while the metadata identifying its owner remains incomplete or wrong.
This is why the programme’s emphasis on transparency matters more than its emphasis on treaties. Ratification sets the legal floor, but distribution reports are what tell an artist whether the system works.
What to watch
The measure of success will not be the workshops. It will be whether any government ratifies the treaties, and whether collecting societies publish figures showing more money distributed.
There are reasons for caution. No budget was announced, no African partner institutions were named, and no participating governments have publicly committed to anything.
The scale of the prize is nonetheless clear. US$286 million a year, from two countries alone, is a large sum to leave uncollected.
For musicians, the practical change would be prosaic. It would look like a statement showing what was played, where, and what it earned.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much money in African music royalties goes uncollected?
An estimated US$286 million in recorded music revenue goes uncollected each year in Kenya and Nigeria alone, according to the Music Economy Development Initiative. The figure covers only those two countries.
What is the IP for Growth programme?
It is a year-long United States initiative training African creators, lawyers and officials in intellectual property, with a focus on music. It began in Geneva and has held workshops in Lagos and Johannesburg.
Which treaties is Washington asking African countries to adopt?
The WIPO Copyright Treaty and the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty. Both were designed to protect works distributed through streaming and downloads.
Why do music royalties go uncollected in Africa?
Radio play often goes unlogged, streaming metadata is incomplete and collecting societies lack systems to match payments to rights holders. The programme targets those administrative gaps.
Sources · Connected Coverage
Primary sources: the US Patent and Trademark Office on the IP for Growth initiative, the US State Department’s Africa Regional Media Hub briefing reported by allAfrica, and the Music Economy Development Initiative on the US$286 million estimate.
The commercial rise of the continent’s music runs through Afrobeats as a Nigerian export and the push to turn Kiswahili into a music market. More cultural reporting sits on our Western Africa desk.
This article was produced by The Rio Times’ automated newsroom system. How we use AI · Report an error
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