Most African countries suffered major economic collapse due to reliance on commodity exports that is subject to significant volatility and instability. Structurally, African minerals and oil exporters whose trade is highly concentrated in few commodities and limited number of partners have experienced very limited economic diversification.
In 1953 when the Korean War ended, the nominal GDP of Korea was $1.3 billion; it grew rapidly for the last six to seven decades; to 1.65 trillion in 2019. The GDP/Capita rose to $32,000 from a mere $158 in 1960. Economic Progress comes only to producers. Poverty is the lot of those that always buys from others. I quote from the Economist magazine five years ago: “BY MAKING things and selling them to foreigners, China has transformed itself—and the world economy with it. In 1990, it produced less than 3% of global manufacturing output by value; its share now is nearly a quarter. China produces about 80% of the world’s air-conditioners, 70% of mobile phones and 60% of shoes.
According to a study of ‘growth miracles’ by the World Bank in 2008, only 13 countries in the world have been able to sustain an annual growth rate of 7% or higher since 1950. Only two countries, both with small populations and highly idiosyncratic economic structures – Botswana and Oman – are among the group of 13 that have not grown because of industrialization[1].
In Nigeria, cocoa production fluctuates between 250,000 to 400,000 tons per year. Nigeria exports about 85% of total cocoa production as raw beans and only process and mostly export the remaining 15% into butter, liquor, powder and cake. Today, with the rapid expansion of cultivation in South-East Asia, Malaysia and Indonesia are the leading producers of palm oil supplying more than 80% of the global production and continue to dominate the international trade. Malaysia earned RMB 67 billion from oil palm in 2018.
The best people for the job never get a peep in. Cronyism and nepotism, the basis of political parties that we operate, ensure that the brightest and the best serve the mediocre. In the end, corruption and self-sabotage of national aspirations by the elite have been at the root of Nigeria’s economic backwardness far more than technological incompetence; important a factor as the latter is.
Okposi Salt Industry: During the Nigerian Civil War, this plant provided Biafra with all its salt. Using very basic technology, women processed water from Okposi Salt Lake and turned it into table salt. It is nowhere to be found today.