In June each year Cameroon's capital Yaoundé opens its arms to Africa's movie elite, with the Ecrans Noirs (Black Screens), an international festival of film. The theme for 2011 was "African Cinema and Its Actors" and the event brought together a large number of film professionals, critics and other industry insiders.

Launched in 1996 by the Cameroonian born Bassek Ba Kobhio, the Ecrans Noirs is a platform set up to promote African cinema and to spotlight its rising stars. The glitzy eight-day event launched on June 18 was held at the Yaoundé Conference Center, presided over by Ama Tutu Muna, Minister of Culture of Cameroon.

The 15th Ecrans Noirs provided an opportunity to examine the state of African cinema, which suffers from lack of infrastructure and film supply, something that affects the entire industry, especially south of the Sahara, with Nigeria and South Africa as notable exceptions. The withdrawal of investment in the film industry by African states in the beginning of the 1990s is one of the main reasons leading to a crisis in the form of mass closures of cinemas. In Cameroon for example, three luxurious cinema complexes, Capitol and Abbia in Yaoundé and Wouri in Douala resisted closure until 2006, but have since closed. All have now been converted into supermarkets. Movie tickets at these cinemas were between $4 and $5 on average.

Fading cinemas

In the Republic of the Congo none of the seven cinemas built in the 1970s survived. These cinemas were all sold to revival churches. Even Burkina Faso, very often presented as the showcase of African film, was no exception. At the end of the 1990s, this country had more than 60 cinemas but today very few are operational. Cote d'Ivoire and Senegal followed suit – they had 60 and 55 cinema halls respectively in the 1980s, but things changed at the end of the 1990s, and today many of them have closed down. Nowadays, Niger and Togo have less than five cinemas while they had more than 20 each in the early 1970s.

The major challenges facing African cinema are multiple. Africa must emphasize industry training at all levels. This needs to be followed by creating infrastructure to promote and distribute African films.

Wasis Diop, an actor and well-known film score composer from Senegal, said that fixing the problems in the film industry was not something the festival attendants could do on their own.

"I believe that this should involve other stakeholders such as the state, the private sector and bankers. If the film industry does not generate enough income, I think it is doomed to disappear, because it is a very costly business," said Diop.

Some countries are already addressing the issue. In Cameroon, for example, an institute for training in cinema and audiovisual has been established in Yaoundé. Film students underwent practical training during the festival of Black Screen. In addition critical seminars on film production took place throughout the festival, in order to adapt students to their chosen fields.