'We need trade, not aid'
2005-07-05 14:05
Nouakchott - Grocery shopping in Mauritania is unenviable at best but is a source of constant frustration for Nancy Abeiderrahmane, founder of the Tiviski Dairy in Nouakchott.
"Twenty-eight different kinds of powdered milk, all imported and all expensive," said the affable English woman, her desk neatly cluttered with stacks of documents, computer printouts and prototypes for packaging, as well as a half-full carton of camel milk, Tiviski's signature product.
"Twenty-eight different kinds! And we have a hard time finding buyers for our fresh milk, even though it's cheaper. In Mauritania, if it's imported, it's automatically considered better."
Such a concept is far from unique to Mauritania, noted a rueful Aimirou Khouma, salesperson for Senegal's Aviculture Material Distribution Centre, standing at the centre of a drafty warehouse in the Keur Massar suburb of Dakar that used to be alive with the sound of clucking chickens.
"This place was packed with farmers who had no choice but to shut down because of imported European chicken," he said.
Forced to import
From costly powdered milk to cheap chickens to sardines fished out of the Atlantic, tinned in Europe and then sent back, foreign agricultural goods routinely squeeze Africans out of their own markets, forcing countries like Mauritania to import up to 70% of its consumables.
And for all the talk about debt relief by the world's leading industrial nations in the run up to their annual Group of Eight (G8) summit this week in Scotland, most Africans say it is free and fair trade, not aid, that is needed to fight poverty on the continent.
"The G8 has to understand a developed Africa can serve its own interests and contribute to world peace; a developed Africa means a larger market for western industrialists and limits the HIV epidemic," said Rene N'Guettia Kouassi, director of economic affairs for the African Union (AU).
Not meeting its goals
Efforts to develop African trade policies have fallen woefully short of their goals and only served to widen the gap with the rest of the world.
A 2000 tax imposed by the West African Economic and Monetary Union to harmonise customs duties across its eight member states and make imports more lucrative meant duties on imported chicken fell from 60% to 20%.
All of a sudden, Senegal was flooded with frozen chicken cutlets, most of them from eastern Europe. According to national aviculture statistics, what was once an import load of 1 137 tons in 1999 shot up to 15 950 tons by 2003.
During the same time period, local production fell from 7 007 tons to 5 982 tons, unable to compete with the low prices of the imported stocks even if the quality was higher.
"We had the capacity to raise 40 000 to 50 000 chicks per week, but we are now down to 6 000 chicks per week," said Youssoupha Dieme, director of the aviculture complex in Mbao, just outside Dakar.
Cutting costs to make ends meet
"We've had to cut our staff, cut their salaries, cut everything. And we still can't pay them."
The inverse ratio between cost and quality does not figure as prominently in the travails of Tiviski dairy, as its products are cheaper and, as Abeiderrahmane says modestly of her silky cheeses and creamy yoghurts, "just a whole lot tastier".
But Tiviski also faces difficulties in exporting its products, barred from the European markets due to the masses of red tape involved in trading with the European Union (EU) and equally constrained by bureaucracy and logistics in efforts to sell to North America or Asia.
"It's been one obstacle after the next: whether it's because Mauritania is not a country certified to export to Europe; or because there are no accurate lab tests for camel milk; or we cannot afford the cost of shipping in refrigerated containers," Abeiderrahmane said, toying with the brightly-coloured waxed paper carton bearing the cheery Tiviski logo.
"But we hear the Saudis are interested in camel milk, and they are thinking about setting up an industry in the Emirates too. So maybe we will look elsewhere, to other markets, that might just be more amenable to African products."