President Yoweri Museveni has addressed leaders at the Russia-Africa Summit about the need for Africa to market their products within and beyond Africa, as well as remove trade barriers to ensure socio-economic development on the continent.
President Museveni was speaking at the two-day Russia-African Summit on Friday, July 28, 2023, where he stated that African economies still face bottlenecks and distortions from the colonial era. The GDP of Africa is currently US$2.7 trillion, smaller than individual economies of countries like Japan, Germany, the United States, and China.
While addressing leaders and officials at the Russia-African Summit, President Museveni said that, partnering countries like Russia, China and India need to understand that African countries, such as Uganda, produce enormous amounts of food with unique nutritional value, such as beef with yellow fat instead of the cholesterol-laden types, potassium-rich bananas, high-cream milk, fish with a maw Nile perch bladder that is a cure for some maladies, millet, Proteins, carbohydrates, and iron which need market and value addition for those products.
President Museveni stated “This stunting of African economies is caused by several bottlenecks, such as the global value of coffee businesses. The global worth of coffee businesses is currently $460 billion.”
Adding, “however, Africa, Brazil, Colombia, Vietnam, and the rest of the world’s coffee-producing countries take only US$25 billion out of this, $25 billion, is shared by all coffee farmers around the world. Out of the 460 billion, Africa’s part is 2.4 billion, with Uganda receiving 800 million dollars because we are now generating 800 million bags of 60 kilograms apiece. Germany, a non-coffee producing country, gets more US dollars from coffee (6.85 billion) than all African coffee producing countries combined.’’
President Museveni stated “The problem with modern slavery in Africa is that Africa is locked into producing raw materials of agriculture, minerals, and other commodities without adding value. A kilogram of good coffee today earns about US$2.5, while the roasted and processed coffee earns about US$40. This haemorrhage has stunted Africa’s growth.’’
In his speech, President Museveni pitched and encourage allies of Russia, India, and China to buy value-added products from Africa, such as processed coffee, chocolate, textiles, steel, iron ore, and electric batteries.
Read also: Support Value Addition, Halt Importing Raw Materials from Africa-Museveni to Putin
President Museveni added that, this will help to address the issues of food production and the free flow of goods and services in the continental free trade area.
He further said that, Uganda is a net exporter of food products, including maize, milk, bananas, fruits, fish, cassava, and beverages, and urged allies of Russia, India and China to create additional value in Africa, which will help in the creation of jobs for the unemployed African youth.
He noted that, wars based on ideological issues are wrong and a waste time and opportunity.
“Human history will move on, and only just wars, like anti-colonial ones, are justified. Wars of hegemony will fail and waste time and opportunity. Dialogue is the correct way to address these issues,” President Museveni said.
The Continental Free Trade Area (CFTA) is uniting the continent’s 1.5 billion people, which is expected to reach 2.5 billion in the next 30 years. Africa has been under-populated for millennia, but modern medicine is expected to bring an optimal population.
