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Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland

face2faceafrica.com

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Re: Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland

#31

Post by bluepizza »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #20
m12k wrote: post #15

I'm reading the book The Divide at the moment. It makes the argument that it takes time and the right conditions to build up an industry - infrastructure needs to be built, education and a skilled labor pool with the necessary know-how as well. To begin with, a fledgling industry in a developing country cannot compete with those of already industrialized countries - these are already so effective that they can underc…

>"we should allow developing countries" Not to pick on you, but I often hear this frasing in the 'first world' and surely you dont 'allow' or 'disallow' internal policies to an sovereign nation? It sounds like a Freudianslip or something, the reality is that its easy to bully or bribe officials in developing nations.

> Not to pick on you, but I often hear this frasing in the 'first world' and surely you dont 'allow' or 'disallow' internal policies to an sovereign nation?

Not exactly. Between forcing their hand on disadvantageous trade deals, lodging complaints and enforcing restrictions with the WTO, and outright installing dictators and funding militias - allowing or disallowing is all what the first world ever does.

Re: Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland

#32

Post by m000 »

I really hope Ivory Coast will join Ghana on this, as they did for the LID bonus case. Together they account for over 2/3 of cocoa production. So, they can pretty much reshape the cocoa/chocolate market and break out of colonialistic trade agreements for the benefit of their people.

Re: Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland

#33

Post by vagrantJin »

tziki wrote: post #10

I wish them success, but my prediction is that in a few years they'll have no successful products and the world's chocolate makers have found new suppliers. You can't just make a decision to create successful products.

Inter African free trade is increasing sharply, so their primary market would likely be other African countries. Maybe that was their trumo card if worst comes to worst.

Re: Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland

#34

Post by zorked »

jariel wrote: post #24
m12k wrote: post #15

I'm reading the book The Divide at the moment. It makes the argument that it takes time and the right conditions to build up an industry - infrastructure needs to be built, education and a skilled labor pool with the necessary know-how as well. To begin with, a fledgling industry in a developing country cannot compete with those of already industrialized countries - these are already so effective that they can underc…

So Saudi Arabia, UAE, Canada and Saudi Arabia are 'stuck' selling natural resources? I think it's probably a much better plant to extract a good deal of wealth from the natural resource and invest it in other areas of higher value creation, even in the same vertical. There's a good chance that Ghana's policies are needlessly constrained. More obviously there are 100 things Ghana could do to improve living conditions…

Do you have any specific knowledge about Ghanaian industry or is this just your opinion? Can you provide some sources for your claims?

Re: Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland

#35

Post by unwind »

bsanr2 wrote: post #19

This is similar to the situation with Global South coffee exports, wherein actual growers only receive a fraction of the revenue from consumer sales (despite the relatively cheap and easy value-add of roasting or conversion into instant coffee) because of logistical concerns, and because Europeans and American just plain do not buy African roast coffee when it appears on their shelves. If these countries were to deci…

This is a pretty minor point, but any proper coffee geek will tell you that the shelf life of roasted coffee is pretty bad.

Thus it makes sense to roast closer to the time when the coffee is made available for sale; shipping from African countries up to Europe, would increase the "latency" a great deal.

I'm sure modern packaging gives a decent shelf life, and TBH I don't worry much about the use-before label on coffee around here, but that's generally because it doesn't last long on the shelf anyway. :)

Re: Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland

#36

Post by edflsafoiewq »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #20
m12k wrote: post #15

I'm reading the book The Divide at the moment. It makes the argument that it takes time and the right conditions to build up an industry - infrastructure needs to be built, education and a skilled labor pool with the necessary know-how as well. To begin with, a fledgling industry in a developing country cannot compete with those of already industrialized countries - these are already so effective that they can underc…

>"we should allow developing countries" Not to pick on you, but I often hear this frasing in the 'first world' and surely you dont 'allow' or 'disallow' internal policies to an sovereign nation? It sounds like a Freudianslip or something, the reality is that its easy to bully or bribe officials in developing nations.

Free trade is usually done on a tit-for-tat basis. I think the GP is saying they should allow protectionist policies without "tatting".

Re: Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland

#37

Post by DSingularity »

oblio wrote: post #27
m12k wrote: post #15

I'm reading the book The Divide at the moment. It makes the argument that it takes time and the right conditions to build up an industry - infrastructure needs to be built, education and a skilled labor pool with the necessary know-how as well. To begin with, a fledgling industry in a developing country cannot compete with those of already industrialized countries - these are already so effective that they can underc…

> So the book argues that when developing countries are pressured into free trade agreements This should have been obvious since the Opium Wars and the Opening of Japan (see Commodore Matthew Perry). All developed countries are pro free trade for markets where they are strong and fiercely protectionist where they are not (or they consider those markets strategic priorities). I'm from Romania. Romania joined the EU in…

WW3 was fought with soft power and economics. Now some countries own other countries and nobody is complaining.

Re: Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland

#38

Post by runawaybottle »

Just flexing that geopolitical hot take: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-11-22/ghana-see...

China’s influence over Africa to secure it’s own cocoa production?

Article from 2017: https://mobile.reuters.com/article/amp/idUKL8N1K35R1

So looks like China paid up this year and got exclusives, and not Switzerland.

What’s the game, I must know. Ghana is Lord Baelish?

Re: Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland

#39

Post by luckylion »

jariel wrote: post #24
m12k wrote: post #15

I'm reading the book The Divide at the moment. It makes the argument that it takes time and the right conditions to build up an industry - infrastructure needs to be built, education and a skilled labor pool with the necessary know-how as well. To begin with, a fledgling industry in a developing country cannot compete with those of already industrialized countries - these are already so effective that they can underc…

So Saudi Arabia, UAE, Canada and Saudi Arabia are 'stuck' selling natural resources? I think it's probably a much better plant to extract a good deal of wealth from the natural resource and invest it in other areas of higher value creation, even in the same vertical. There's a good chance that Ghana's policies are needlessly constrained. More obviously there are 100 things Ghana could do to improve living conditions…

> So Saudi Arabia, UAE, Canada and Saudi Arabia are 'stuck' selling natural resources?

Canada maybe not so much, but Saudi Arabia and the UAE? Yeah, and I think they understand that as well. If we have a fusion breakthrough next year, what will Saudi Arabia export besides Wahhabism?

Re: Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland

#40

Post by jelling »

tziki wrote: post #10

I wish them success, but my prediction is that in a few years they'll have no successful products and the world's chocolate makers have found new suppliers. You can't just make a decision to create successful products.

Same. I am concerned they are overlooking how much marketing mind-share Switzerland has globally for chocolate. Ghana could get there but it will not happen overnight, more like a generation. Distribution will also take time.

Give that cocoa is their number 3 export - and I suspect most of that is in raw form - I really hope this doesn’t backfire. They need foreign currency.

A wiser path might be to build up global chocolate brands in parallel to raw exporting, sort of like we’re seeing China move up the value chain from value-added manufacturing to consumer brands.

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