The Sullivan Summits are organized by the Leon H. Sullivan Foundation and held biennially in an African nation to highlight key issues and best practices, stimulate discussion, define opportunities, promote private enterprise and foster high-level strategic partnerships. 

The Biennial Leon H. Sullivan Summit is the embodiment of Leon Sullivan’s dream to re-connect the nations and people of Africa with a displaced Diaspora spread out across the world.  His concept was simple – knowledge of heritage and history is innately strengthening.  Without a sense of history and ancestry, Africa’s lost sons and daughters cannot truly be free to reach their highest potential.  This dream, and the awe inspiring reunion, is realized every few years through the historic gatherings of the Sullivan Summit.  As the flagship program of the Sullivan Foundation, the Summits have also brought focus to developmental opportunities and initiatives in the areas of infrastructure development, tourism, health, environment, and education.

Friends of Africa have the opportunity to be a part of a historic pilgrimage that brings attention to socioeconomic development across the Continent.  More recently, the Summit has delivered (in addition to high level economic dialogue and engagement) a water drilling rig and the production of a clean water well to serve more than 40,000 people in a selected village in Arusha, Tanzania; the acquisition and distribution of specially treated mosquito nets to create more than ten malaria free villages; the shipping of more than $100,000 worth of textbooks to the school system in Tanzania; and the adoption of a local school to revitalize the facility and to make it conducive for more than 200 students to learn.  The Summits have been attended most recently by President George W. Bush and President William J. Clinton.

We are noted for our nonpartisan posture as well as our unwavering commitment to democratic ideals, both in the US and across the world.  The Leon H. Sullivan Summit is the first internationally recognized Summit of world leaders, convened on African soil, by a non-governmental private foundation.  We are proud and honored to continue this great legacy and to retain that distinction almost 20 years after the first convening in 1991.