Salif,
I think that this is exactly the kind of nuanced information that is missing. How would the paradigm of Aid to African countries, or interventions from the west be changed if for example, more people were aware of the work of entrepreneurs like you? How would the behemoth structures of Aid and development adjust?
That's a very powerful point Deborah. To try and bring out some more of those on-the-ground perspectives, Business Action for Africa and the Initiative for Global Development recently published this report, "The New Africa: From Growth to Jobs". We published some great blogs from the report, including this one by Njeri Rionge, Kenyan Serial Entrepreneur and Business Mentor.
I think we need to breakdown what we mean by aid. For example, aid in the form of grants or loans to build irrigation canals or fund research of drought-resistant seeds is vital and more that welcome. However, dumping surplus grain on a country undergoing a food "access" crisis but not a food "availability" crisis is damaging.
In addition, in the past bilateral and multilateral aid almost went exclusively to governments prior to being disbursed to various projects but aid is increasingly bypassing government ministries and going straight to organizations both non-profit and for-profit and hopefully that trend continues.
In Mali for example, USAID is increasingly looking for and encouraging local organizations and businesses to apply for its requests for proposals ranging from agriculture projects to water and sanitation. The only drawback, for social entrepreneurs is that one cannot make a profit directly from the grant that you receive but it is not an insurmountable challenge
Yes, it might be getting better. However I am not sure if African journalists have still the same voice talking about their people who are urgently in need of health equity and food security. In the Northern Ethiopia where I practice, 40% of under-five children are malnourished (protein-energy deficiency), just because of lack of food. That means, they are more prone to infections, they die earlier, and will be less intellectual, if they survive. Have you heard of it? No. Is there any one who has heard of this? No. Is the issue of urgent global matter? Yes. My voice will now be heard, even though powerlessly. But who will hear the voice of 40% children having marasmus and kwashiorkor?
Once on the field, priority is given for Africans for their own issue. Clearly Western figures have more priority in Western media as they can make the scenario more attractive and describe it in a "Western" way.
Really great points made in this discussion - but what can we do about it? From our side, we'd like to do more to tell the stories of the courageous entrepreneurs and social entrepreneurs making a difference on the ground - in Africa, as well as in other regions of the world. Please get in touch if you'd like to share a story!
Rachael,
I think a paradigm shift is already underway but not yet complete. Because of budgetary pressures in the US and Europe, official development assistance, I believe will continue to dwindle and will most exclusively be to help with humanitarian crises.
In addition, aid agencies would continue to use the term "investment" instead of donation or "giveaway." They are already adjusting by increasingly funding entrepreneurs and not just government ministries or agencies. A perfect example is Mamelles Jaboot, a husband and wife venture in Senegal that makes healthy, millet-based yogurt. They now receive grants from the US government's Feed the Future Initiative to expand production in order to supply school children with at least one healthy meal a day.
Thanks Andrew, you are right there is a danger in over-emphasizing the entrepreneurial side of the question, but since we know that many do a great job on the ground, then even for interventions which don't have a market, it is the same entrepreneurs that can help and be think tanks of how to make interventions have no market but may have great impacts on development be scaled up and implemented. I agree, they would probably not work for everything.
With regards to Rwanda, as I mentioned earlier, its the governments' strong leadership, commitment and have a clear vision of where they want to go and sticking to that firmly. Furthermore, they have managed to coordinate very well the donor assistance, which has been not so of a case in many similar countries in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) where in many cases the aids are so fragmented and thus hard to have the governments coordination and thus use them all in one bucket to enable the implementation of more effective interventions. lastly, I think its also their fearless and daring plans, being the first country in SSA to implement the national cervical cancer vaccine, and also empowering their community health workers to take charge of managing community infections like pneumonia etc something that other countries hesitate to try
Salif - that's a great example - thanks for sharing.
I also think the outsiders only listen to what people tell them and not the real truth. In most cases they are told what they want to hear. It would be important for the local population to speak among themselves without hiding any information or putting across a stand that only pleases the donor but does not meet the needs of the people. This will go a long way into ensuring that the real needs are addressed in the most effective and efficient way. The missing link here is hearing from the ground and not only from the decision makers and politicians who rarely understand the situation on the ground
We are on the ground running in Tanzania. We run a small grassroots NGO providing 100% free quality education to disadvantaged children. (We are very small) Some of the biggest obstacles I see with business in Tanzania is thinking outside of the box. So many individuals see others doing something and they think I could do that do and become rich, however the reality is that the profit margin is very small. Capital is needed for any large business and many Africans don't have access to it.
Doing business in Tanzania is difficult. There are hefty taxes, duty and VAT leaving the business owner with a relatively small profit margin There is also quite a bit of corruption.
Despite the corruption, I think the biggest detriment is the Duty and VAT. there is a 60% VAT on all dairy products, making cheese, yogurt, butter etc very costly. Most big businesses that come into Tanzania find it much more difficult than neighboring countries. There is also a 33% income tax on profits.
These are some of the obstacles Tanzanians are facing in doing business. It is just not easy...
Ethiopia, which had almost constant health expenditure of about 5% of the GDP for decades and in which most preventive and curative health care was dependent on international aid, showed healthcare improvement only in recent years after which the Ministry of Health launched an innovative healthcare system through its Health Extension Program. In this program preventive medicine is emphasized and is performed by Health Extension Workers (community health workers). This has improved maternal and child deaths near to achieving the Millennium Development Goals in spite of cuts in international aid in recent years.
This is such a good point, and speaks to the biases that creep into any story based on stakeholders and audiences. How do we get the complete, most accurate story?
Thanks to everyone for participating, including the Aspen Institute New Voices Fellows! We'll leave this discussion open, so please do continue the conversation!
If you want to learn more about the Aspen Institute New Voices Fellowship, visit their website, or follow them on Twitter (@AspenNewVoices)
Thank you so much, Zahid! We're happy for the opportunity to share our thoughts here.
Outsiders' opinions (and, subsquently, decisions) about Africa are guided by published reports (such as Doing Business, Logistics Performance Index, Risk ratings, etc). The reports don't tell the whole story due to limitations in the methodology, time lapses, availability of data and so on, but as they become referenced more widely, these reports end up influencing countries' ability to attract investment and to some extent, aid.
There is definitely a case for local voices but who will mobilise them? Where aid and charity are viewed as a source of employment, income and influence, how do we ensure that the local voices are authentic and not nuanced to specific interests? Kassahun's suggestion needs to address this challenge.
I couldn’t agree more, Jane. In addition, as the saying goes, "you’re entitled to your own opinion but not your own facts."
Rachel, for a more accurate story, besides “unbiased advice/feedback” we also need better quality data and metrics.
And I am also a believer, that “wants” are equally and sometimes even more important than “needs” in terms of achieving impact. Both are necessary.
This is a great initiative. I have been running through and all of you are putting across great ideas. I will sort of give a broad response/questions first and with time get to specifics.
1-There are different voices coming from Africa. As some of you put it, there are voices from Africa telling what they think people would like to hear. Needless to add, even if this is not true. Lets ask the question, why do they do this?
2- The point on the media is interesting. I have heard many folks in the media say this or that is not news. On the other hand, project implementers have not targeted the media very well in most cases. This is not suprising as most of us have been used to writing technical reports, project reports. How can we change this?
3. Related to the point above, yes there are powerless voices in Africa. How can we find them and make them powerful?
4. Is it always true that western countries have failed to give Africa a chance, to give African a chance to voice their real needs?
I would like to imagine that it would be great outsiders told the story but that they told the true story. we need to give outsiders the true story. This is the challenge - who, how and where will Africans give outsiders the true story to tell.
I totally agree with you, social enterprise is the way to go. Many a time the social entrepreneur comes from the heart of the problem and they easily prescribe innovative and creative solutions to the social limitation. Only this morning I was talking to some youth who have devised ways of earning income in Zimbabwe. You will not believe the creativity they have. They go around the farms and collect discarded old steel wheels of trailers and make very nice rustic and unique park benches with them. They also collect very old discarded bike frames, old exhaust pipes, old dishes old plates and various steel components and make beautiful rustic art pieces with them. The benches sell for $300 and the bike frames art for $100.A rather high price because of their uniqueness and you will not get them in any furniture shop. Now as a social innovator/entrepreneur, I engaged them in conversation, and asked what their limitations are. They advised me that the old wheels from farms or villages are now very difficult to come by, but the market is just in love with their products and sell like hot cakes to use as garden benches and pieces of rare art for their gardens. They have no place and good equipment to work in and with. In my local Spar supermarket there is one of the bikes with an imitation of a person using a rustic old exhaust, beautifully and creatively done, The supermarket use it to display newspapers and magazines and very innovative. On the bikes they get the material relatively easily and business is good. I am then looking for ways to manufacture the old wheels for them. This is a clear demonstration that the very people who have an unemployment problem can come with a lasting solution that has the potential to turn into a thriving enterprise. My condition of setting them up is that 60% of their after tax profits must go to a social venture of their choice. This is to be supervised by a holding entity called Rava Exclusive Social Enterprise Group that will warehouse 60% equity and the youths will hold 40%. However after agreed benchmarks/milestones and the enterprise is well established and mature the equity will be reversed with the youths group getting 60% and Rava Group 40%. Rava Means Read in our mother tongue. This group is a profit earning vehicle for Rava Zimbabwe Rava Trust, a non profit that motivates Zimbabweans to read beyond academia and resources libraries throughout the country with life improvement books. Notice we have not talked about donations up to now, we actually welcome loans that will be paid back. In Zimbabwe for the past ten years we have not known of any donations due to British imposed sanctions and that has been a blessing in disguise as it has brought creativity and innovativeness in our youth and general populace who themselves no longer value donations. Yes local solutions lies into the salvation of Africa and fair foreign funding and not donations then compliments these initiatives. Our youth have now grown a sense of independence due to the past political onslaught and now truly believe that power for any one comes within and one is weak only because he has depended on help from outside In fact it is not a secret that the current Zimbabwean president for all his perceived ills has always advocated for tapping power within and not without, and more and more youths have come to that realisation. Watch the meteoric rise the country will go through once the strangulation is released. In 2012 the Africa Entrepreneurial Award was won by a Zimbabwean lady run security company out of 146 entrants from the continent.