Africa/News

Post-WTO African trade

Posted on by Ahmed ESSADKI

In the seventies of the past century, while studying in Lausanne, I sometimes listened to a weekly flagship program at that time from French-speaking Swiss radio called “Fête comme chez vous” which was presented by the star host, the late Michel Dénériaz. During one of these broadcasts, he sang, with the participants, the song “Vive nous” which the Swiss citizen cherished. The Swiss had reason to boast of being the richest country in the world (per capita), to live in opulence, calm and serenity.

On our continent, even if there is recognition that Africa is potentially very rich, the populations which live there were on the whole impoverished. There are many reasons to explain this anomaly, which stem from our past colonization, some of which relate to the systematic looting of our agricultural and agrifood resources are discussed here and there in this blog. What matters to us now is to say that we can get out of this ghetto if we are willing to do so.

It is worth recalling, under this register, that in the aftermath of the last Great War, Germany was a completely dilapidated country and the whole of its population plunged in black misery. The Germans had, at the same time, to find a way to survive in a ravaged Germany, to cleanse the country of millions of bombs, sometimes still active, dropped during the conflict by the allies everywhere in the cities and the countryside and to start to rebuild the country. Assisted by the Americans, the German authorities appealed to the population to help this gigantic project. People, many of whom did not have more identity and / or legitimation papers, simply had to indicate their first and last names and specify their type of activity and / or their know-how. On this basis, and nothing else, money, because it was needed, was given to them to enable them to perform the tasks assigned to them. The Americans, who brought most of this money through the Marshall Plan, demanded no real guarantee for the advance of this money and German officials trusted their citizens for the good use of this windfall. We know what Germany has become again.

Other countries also found themselves temporarily trapped in misery and emerged from it by trusting the loyalty and genius of their citizens. This was notably the case for Japan and South Korea.

Colonization, as devastating if not more than the war itself, left, in the case of Morocco, a shocked, exhausted and penniless country. Consequently, since its independence from colonial France, Morocco gave, for considerations that go beyond the interests of this blog, largely the impression of standing still. For example, some thirty years ago, our country did not at some point have enough to pay in foreign currency for a load of grain and the boat had to leave Casablanca without unloading its cargo! But for the past 20 years, Morocco has undertaken to take back its destiny and its free will. The result was not long in coming. Today, it is enough that a Moroccan institutional body expresses on the international market a need for financing to receive several times the amount wanted and without guarantee of the State.

There is a national consensus in Morocco that the regaining control over  the country started by restoring confidence in Moroccans in themselves and what they can achieve through, for example, the launch of the National Initiative for Human Development, or INDH (http://www.indh.ma/) by His Majesty King Mohammed VI in the 2000s. A large number of young and old have received money, more or less, to work on tasks which have enabled them to regain confidence in gainful work. The money was given to them on the basis of confidence in their know-how without any other guarantee requirement of any kind. While the material guarantee has always been a prerequisite for accessing a bank loan regardless of the amount. In reality, this requirement of systematic material guarantee to access a bank credit is at the origin of a large part of our ills in Africa and has contributed greatly to maintain us in the status of underdeveloped. And this constraint bears the imprint of mainly European donors to maintain a status quo which benefits, among Moroccan elite, to a small active minority which is committed to keeping us in the status of economic colonized.

Building on the full success of this first initiative for the benefit of the most deprived, His Majesty King Mohammed VI gave his instructions, in his speech at the opening of the parliamentary session last October, for the renewal of this approach but in bigger and with more means to consolidate the economic development of the country. Already, young people who have projects can now benefit from loans without preconditions of real guarantee or personal guarantee and everywhere in Morocco.

To appreciate the value of these initiatives, it should be recalled that, as regards the African agro-food sector, it is largely subordinated, directly or commercially, to European principals. In addition, according to our knowledge, the EU had taken its precautions and urged Morocco to commit itself to reserving to Europeans the same commercial advantages that it would have to offer to another commercial actor. All in all, Europeans have thought of everything to stay in charge of our agricultural and agrifood projects until the end of time. With the aforementioned royal initiatives, which will benefit Moroccans (Africans) first, the Kingdom elegantly frees itself from this obligation to do the same for Europeans. In short, we are regaining our sovereignty over our agricultural wealth and its transformation as well as our free will to export it where we want it and first to Africa.

But export now depends on adherence to benchmarks that are trusted by consumers. With the blocking of the WTO, for having been heavily discredited (see under  http://alkhabir.org/en/the-african-commercial-renaissance/), continental Europe loses a strong argument that allowed it to brandish the threat to use this body against an African country which does not strictly comply with EU standards. Then there is the fact that the EU market is running out of steam and, in the opinion of some exporters, this market is increasingly speculative and less and less profitable. There is therefore a need for our African operators to see, while keeping our European outlets, to conquer other more profitable markets which are found in America and Asia. These countries have always applied FDA standards. These standards are now derived from the new American Food Safety Modernization Act or FSMA. The law in question is presented in a didactic way in the manual: https://www.ifsh.iit.edu/sites/ifsh/files/departments/fspca/pdfs/FSPCA_PC_Human_Food_Course_Participant_Manual_V1.2_Watermark.pdf

By diversifying our export, we will have a better chance of taking advantage of all the potential African resources we have. And who knows, maybe in our turn, we might at some point in the future sing the song: “Long live us Africans“.

We wish good luck to all of our operators in the African agrifood sectors.

Africa/Expertise

The African Commercial Renaissance

Posted on by Ahmed ESSADKI

In current trade with the rest of the world, our Continent has taken the bandwagon. Or, rather, he was pushed to take it under rules made outside his will or interests, but to which Africa had no choice but to submit.

These rules, the foundations of which were laid by the United States in the aftermath of the last Great War, were designed to deal primarily with trade disputes between one sovereign state and another. In those days, America had a long and comfortable lead over all other countries in virtually every area and was little concerned with the potential competition from a third country. After the GATT (General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade), the WTO (World Trade Organization), also in Geneva, is the body responsible for ensuring compliance with the rules in question.

To put it simply, a State which feels aggrieved by the commercial practices of another State submits, like what is done before the courts, its grievances to the WTO and waits on the reasoned opinion of this international court. When, in its reasoned opinion, the WTO accepts the arguments of the complainant state, it also advocates commercial measures to compensate for the damage suffered.

Pending the verdict, the hurted country can of course continue to trade with other partners in other markets more acceptable to its taste.

In this respect, if any of the OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) countries, or other countries like China, has submitted grievances to the WTO in the past, African countries have not been inclined to seek consultations from this body. Indeed, using the WTO service is not simple and can be very expensive for our penniless countries. It is necessary to prepare a solidly documented and argued case, that is to say made by insider experts, who are usually found in Western countries and come back very expensive.

In addition, if we consider certain cases listed, these experts do not always offer a sufficient guarantee of neutrality in the files entrusted to them. This is particularly the case when it comes to the questioning of his own country. Then there is the time taken by the WTO to reach its verdict at first instance, which is counted in years. In addition, before the WTO decision is enforceable, it can be challenged before the appeal body (see below) and, again, the judgment can take many years in turn. For all these considerations, few low-income countries like ours in Africa could afford the services of the WTO.

In practice, our countries which export products from the agri-food sector have become accustomed to redirecting the product to another, more conciliatory country, if their first export fails. Thus, thirty years ago and more, it had happened, for example, that canned Moroccan sardines, whose histamine level had been judged to be non-standard by Germany, were accepted in France or in Italy.

However, in the 1990s, European countries, whose local regulations (in each country) remained different from each other as they have always been, accelerated the establishment of new “harmonized health standards”, applicable to their external border posts. In short, a harmonization decided in order to lock the Community market and better weigh on trade negotiations conducted separately with, in particular, each of our poor African countries.

From then on, exports of agri-food products from our African countries began to suffer seriously because the refusal of a product by an EU country closed the door to the entire single market. The EU has found in this arsenal of private standards, tailor-made to administer access to their common market, a new formidable means of coercion to illegitimately exploit African Food Raw Materials for their almost exclusive benefit while exercising a downward pressure on prices. This scheme has worked well in the case of African countries to the point that, apparently, the EU has felt the eagerness to test it elsewhere in their negotiations in other Forums.

To give more weight to this unprecedented maneuver of instrumentalization of the Community market for the purposes of trade negotiations, the EU has completed its paraphernalia by giving itself certain attributes which are the responsibility of a sovereign country such as flag, anthem, embassies etc. The supposedly sought-after goal of the EU, which absorbs the vast majority of exports from the African agri-food sector, was to weigh more heavily, inter alia, on negotiations of all kinds with our African countries, taken separately, for product prices traded and for trade preferences. Not only the European Bloc could, through the Brussels Commission, sanction a recalcitrant country by using instruments to restrict its trade with the EU, but it has become possible for it to use other sanctions, if necessary, in the diplomatic field.

Putting it bluntly, the EU has somehow cleverly distorted the predefined use of WTO trade rules. While these rules were to be used to deal with disputes between two countries in disagreement, on the basis of Codex standards, the EU has, on its own initiative, appropriated the right to use them in its negotiations on the basis of private standards in a balance of power of 28 European states, plus the EU considered in this connection as a separate state, against African countries taken individually one after the other. It seems difficult in these conditions not to win each time, especially if such negotiations are coupled with threats of trade and / or diplomatic sanctions.

The use of EU private standards in place of Codex standards to influence negotiations, however, showed its limits when the European Bloc used them in the discussions in the Doha Round Forums. India was among the first countries to denounce the European Bloc’s maneuvers. But this enduring EU practice will have lasted long enough to leave no doubt in the eyes of American officials that the purpose for which the WTO was originally set up was completely deviated by the EU to serve its exclusive commercial interests in full view of all. So, acting according to the adage “At the top of the effort, there is action“, the US has vetoed the renewal of the judges of the WTO appellate body rendering de facto this body inoperative since December 11th.

Of course, trade in the international trade arena, as is the case in other fields, will always need rules. The WTO will therefore have to be rethought in the light of the changes that have taken place in the world since the last Great War. In this context, there is the fact that Africa is aware, in particular, of its strong potential on the agrifood level and would legitimately want to take advantage of it as fair. The leaders of the ACFTA (African Continental Free Trade Area), which is being set up, will therefore naturally have a say in the development and implementation of the new rules for managing international trade which will be devolved to the WTO in its upcoming version.

The renaissance of African international trade comes at this price.

Africa/News

Post-Brexit Africa

Posted on by Ahmed ESSADKI

The agreement that Morocco has signed in recent days with United Kingdom, which will enter into force once Brexit concluded, aims to ” to restore in the context of the bilateral relations between Morocco and the United Kingdom, all the benefits that they granted each other under the Morocco-EU Association Agreement “. It follows that, from a common desire, the terms of the Association Agreement between Morocco and the EU would be transposed into the new framework of Morocco-British relations. This obviously includes trade in the agri-food sector, topic of interest for this blog. Now, if  the issue of “Quotas” for agricultural products (to which Morocco may be subject), which are essentially aimed at protecting the interests of the Euro-Mediterranean countries in the EU market, should not play a significant role in future commercial exchanges between Morocco and UK, it is going to be different concerning the question of standards (non-tariff barriers). Indeed, the British will be brought to recover all their latitude on the application of their own standards (momentarily in stand-by waiting for the divorce in question) of Sanitary Security of the Foods that the Food Standards Agency (FSA) will be reintroducing to British border posts as soon as the agreement signed between Morocco and the UK, mentioned above, enters into force. Since the UK is a net importer of agri-food products, particularly fresh products, our exporters must therefore prepare for this relatively close deadline to take advantage of the opportunities of this lucrative market like that of the USA. In this regard, the FSA‘s approach to protecting the health of the UK consumer and enforcing existing regulations is closer to the FDA‘s role for the US market than to the European Food Safety Agency (EFSA) for the common market. While the US and UK agencies have real power to intervene each in its target market to protect the consumer and enforce the law, EFSA simply has an advisory role to the Brussels Commission. The enforcement of the rules of each of the EU countries’ markets is strictly governed by the governmental laws of each member country. Many state reports from EU member states, or community bodies, show that enforcement of the Food Safety Law may differ significantly from one EU country to another.

As far as we are concerned in Morocco, this has meant that the vast majority of our food exporters to EU market have become accustomed to carrying out their operations according to French standards. In this context, the observation shows that it is not uncommon for a Bulletin of Laboratory Analyzes, completed on the basis of analyzes carried out on the taking of some samples, is sufficient, in the eyes of our Autonomous Establishment of Export Coordination and Control (EACCE), also known as “Morocco Foodex”, for authorizing the export of the entire batch manufactured to EU market. But this will most likely not be enough for exporting to the individualized UK market. Indeed, the FSA and FDA recognize the superiority of HACCP (Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points), possibly supplemented by laboratory analyzes, as the standard for measuring the quality of a food product. This said, confirmation of the application of the HACCP system by a Food Production Unit requires certification by a Competent Authority. As a result, companies, Moroccan in particular and African in general, interested in exporting to the UK market, soon available to us, would do better to integrate from now on this unavoidable dimension of  certification of their “Processes”.

Second, the adoption of the HACCP approach will, beyond the UK market, improve the chances of our agribusiness companies to gain access to US market, which presents unique opportunities for our agri-food exporters, particularly for fresh produce. In this regard, the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) has for the first time put in place scientifically modeled rules for the trade (export for our purposes) of fresh fruit and vegetables (unprocessed) in the US market. In the case of farm-based products, prepared on the farm itself (but not processed), the commercial (export) rules to be respected are very flexible and do not involve additional costs for the management of the farm. The same situation applies to the products of a cooperative, or a set of cooperatives working in collaboration. These sanitary rules are hardened as soon as buyers domiciled elsewhere put themselves between the farm, or cooperative (s), and the US market. In this case, the work to be done by these people to conform FSMA, and the costs generated by this protocol, increase considerably. To put it simply, it is the end of the time when intermediaries, especially European ones, used to buy products from us (olives, capers, dried peppers and others) at ridiculous prices to resell them on the American market, after playing mainly with labeling, with huge margins. Moreover, the adoption by our exporting companies of the HACCP approach will familiarize them more with the reasoning in terms of risk that can pose the process of manufacturing a certain product in a given environment. This salutary effort will then be a valuable preamble to the adoption of HARPC (Hazard Analysis Risk-Based Preventive Control). This new system, which represents the cornerstone of the new US FSMA regulation, is built on the HACCP mode but applies, beyond HACCP-specific critical control points, to any stage or point (as shown by the hazard analysis) of the entire operations of the manufacturing  system in its environment, including cGMP (Current Good Manufacturing Practices). In a way, it is a HACCP of wider application.

On another level, if the FDA, like the FSA besides, ensures respect of FSMA and consumer protection, the US Federal Agency puts full responsibility for the production of food compliant with the FSMA on the shoulders of American operators. With regard to imported products, it is the US importer that the law entrusts the task of ensuring by any appropriate means, described in the law, the conformity of the imported product with the requirements of FSMA. The good side of this regulation is that once their products are registered on the FDA‘s dedicated portal, our exporters no longer have to worry about the US administration but only deal with their US trading partner. In this perspective, the American importer and the Moroccan (African) exporter are both interested in their operations succeeding to bring profit to everyone. Less administrative worries save time, money and provide the peace of mind. We wish good luck to our African exporters with FSMA.

News

Indiscretions of Brexit

Posted on by Ahmed ESSADKI

The draft Brexit agreement negotiated until the end of 2018 by former British Prime Minister Theresa May with the EU Commission included, after formalization of the “divorce” of the two parties, a transitional step with a “Backstop” – measure intended to prevent the establishment of an inter-Irish border between the EU Group and United Kingdom (UK), i.e. between the Republic of Ireland (a sovereign state member of UE) and Northern  Ireland (an integral part of the UK) – But as a consequence of that arrangement, Britain would have to be remaining in EU customs, the time for the “two divorced” to define a lasting solution that would guarantee integrity of the single market (requirement of the EU Commission) while maintaining  a smooth flow of goods and people within Ireland (Irish-British requirement). However, as it stands, the abovementioned draft agreement does not provide any answer as to the actual date of exit of United Kingdom from EU custom rules. This is likely to paralyze any attempt by the UK to seek commercial relations on its own behalf with other non-EU countries. Considering that this constraint is unacceptable, the British parliamentarians (British is equivalent to English for this article) have refused the Brexit project (in its different forms) presented by Mrs. Theresa May.

After Mrs. May, it is the turn of Mr. Boris Johnson, new British Prime Minister, to face the EU leaders for the continuation of the settlement of this issue of “Divorce” UK / EU. Mr. Johnson has, in essence, introduced a new approach, radically different from that imposed on Mrs. May for Brexit negotiations that consisted indeed for former Prime Minister to come up with proposals to be agreed on by the UE.  Mr. Johnson transferred kind “Stress” to the EU by making them understand that he is not ready to do any such proposals and it belongs to UE to come forward with a Brexit-plan for the UK to agree on. The reasons for such a radical change of Paradigm on the part of the British do not seem obvious at first glance. However, we can reflect on the basis of Brexit information available to the public to try and see more clearly in this strategy.

Forty-six years ago, on the first of January 1973, UK saw its request (after other failures due mainly to the opposition of President de Gaulle) to join the common market (which was to become the EU) finally accepted. The Republic of Ireland, in the furrow of UK, entered the single market at the same moment. At that time, an English engineer was paid an average monthly salary of about three hundred Swiss francs, equivalent to what was paid to Swiss trainee apprentices aged between sixteen and eighteen. This to say that the English economy was living a dramatic empty passage and the English tried at all costs to hang their wagon to a big locomotive to revitalize their economy. Once in the European community, the English have rolled up their sleeves and worked hard to regain their industrious spirit equivalent to that of the “Made in Germany“. Since then, the rise of the British stature has not ceased to strengthen to this day. Moreover, the English have always been a net contributor to the EU project, that is, they gave more direct money to the EU than they received in return.

Since Referendum of 2016, basically in tune with President Trump’s last speech to the United Nations, indicating that a country that has self-confidence does not need to protect itself under the umbrella of any Bloc – alluding of course to the EU Bloc as judged by the subsequent intervention on the same platform of the President of the European Council, Mr. Donald Tusk -, the British want to illustrate this self-confidence by expressing their desire to trace (again) their own journey among the nations by themselves and for themselves. But, the question of why what Theresa May negotiated less than a year ago (Backstop) seems suddenly obsolete for the new Prime Minister remains full! In addition, Mr. Johnson gives the impression now of wanting to negotiate with the EU in a position of strength!

In this respect, although the EU (without the English) still has 27 countries, the Franco-German tandem is the duo that has the greatest influences on the direction of economic and trade policy vis-à-vis other third countries. The English, who will have stayed almost half a century in the EU, know it very well. Moreover, with regard to Africa (the EU’s still guarded hunt) and its agricultural resources, an area of ​​interest to this Blog, Germany’s voice exists but it is often shaped by that of France which considers itself at home in the French speaking Africa. For example, the German commercial and economic bodies operating in the private sector in Morocco (elsewhere in Africa probably too) are often run by French people who never forget to take into account the interest of France in their actions. To put it simply, France makes us understand that the French are helping us access the EU market and makes it clear to Germans and other members of the EU that they better do rely on France for their African business. But here, Africa also has a good half of English-speaking countries where the intervention of the English can be more important than that of the French. In this perspective, once out of the EU bloc, and Boris Johnson does not stop repeating that it will do so on October 31, the UK can be an equally relevant tool for a business to succeed in Africa, particularly in English speaking area. Germany, which has lost its former colonies thanks, in particular, to France’s diplomatic methods of retaliation (after the first great war), understands this dilemma and does not want to make a new mistake in ranging itself behind position of France in the Brexit negotiations. Reason why, probably, we saw German nuanced positions a few times closer to the English position than that of France. It seems that the English, who have well integrated this divergence of Franco-German views on the Brexit, have decided to take advantage of this gap to the maximum. They make it clear in their own way that the Brexit “Stress” is more on the side of EU than on the British one. In this context, they are already prospecting in Africa to promote, locally with us for example, a strategic relationship with the Kingdom of Morocco. In Southern Africa, they have undertaken to update their long-standing relations with this area of ​​our Continent, etc.

On another level, the agricultural products needed by British consumers, who come now mainly from the EU, will be replaced by exports from Morocco and other African countries as early as November 1, which are more fresh and much cheaper.  Germany, as far as it is concerned, is likely to have already prepared to establish a strong relationship with the UK post-Brexit to continue the privileged relations between the two countries. Under these conditions, the solution to maintain the integrity of the single market post-Brexit, essential according to the words of the chief negotiator of the EU Brexit, Mr. Michel Barnier, will remain a thorn in the feet of decision makers in Brussels. It is, as we understand it, the meaning to give to the “Stress” of Brexit which is now on the side of the EU. Considering lack of enthusiasm of Boris Johnson accepting a further extension of the UK’s stay in the EU Bloc, it is easy to deduce that this will be kind of Berezina within the EU Commission as soon as next Halloween. And this is, in our opinion, only the prelude to the other great catastrophe that awaits the EU Bloc with the painful dismantling predictable Euro zone that will not fail to follow.

We Africans will, for the first time, have the opportunity to offer our agricultural resources to several foreign buyers (putting them in competition), first among them US, UK and what will remain of the EU Bloc.

News

The Court of Auditors overwhelms ONSSA

Posted on by Ahmed ESSADKI

In recent days, several national media have reported the release of the Report-indictment of 2018 of the Court of Auditors on the work of ONSSA (National Office of Sanitary Safety of Food Products). The extreme weakness of the work of the supervisory authority over our Moroccan agro-industrial sector can be summed up by the sentence in the report: “the health of the consumer is exposed to real dangers“; no need for more comment. This report confirms our many concordant observations illustrated by a multitude of cases detailed in several articles of this blog of which a spicy example is reported under: http://alkhabir.org/en/amateurism-at-the-top-of-onssa/. That being said, Mr. Driss Jettou, a charming and persuasive Manager doubled by a great servant of the Moroccan State, President of the Court of Auditors that signs this report, should be, in our opinion, the last to appear surprised of the elements to charge against ONSSA officials. First of all, many of the officials of this organization, which began in 2009, simply continue the practices of another age they learned while working under the previous title of “Directorate of Technical Services and Fraud Control”, which is an organism with working methods inherited from the colonial era. Then, the « Enforcement Officers » of this Directorate in question (God willing to forgive them) did a lot of zeal to distinguish between the quality of products for local consumption, that is to say for us Moroccans (lax control), and those for export on the metropolis, where tight control had to be carried out (our archives). These colonial practices – long assumed by the EACCE (https://www.eacce.org.ma), which prefers to call itself now “Morocco Foodex” – abolished in the new Food safety law 28-07 of 2010 (same strictness of control for all products), were still in force while Mr. Jettou was Minister of Commerce, Industry and Crafts in the Government of late Mr. Abdellatif Filali in the nineties. It is also in this capacity that Mr. Jettou, who came to inaugurate at the head of a government commission the opening of the Salon of the Food of Morocco (SAM) of Casablanca in February 1996, stopped at the booth that we held under the title “Cabinet d’Expertise Dr Essadki” on the occasion of this first event of its kind in Morocco.

During this brief meeting with Mr. Jettou, he assured us that the Government’s priority is to transfer Food Quality Control operations to the private sector. We had no reason to question such an announcement, made in public by a Minister who was considered to be the most credible of the Moroccan Government of the moment. On the contrary, we rejoiced in thinking that the era of impunity had sounded for an institution (Repression of Fraud) which included a nest full of corrupt officials (our archives). We even naively relayed this information everywhere because conveyed by a source (Minister Jettou) that everyone considered safe at the time. In fact, nothing has changed in the years that followed. And in 2006, ten years later, in the absence of a follow-up to the assertions of the Minister, and in connection with the release of my book “The Mechanics of the Repression of Frauds” that listed innumerable examples, compiled during my work as a sworn expert at the Court of Appeal of Casablanca, that show continuation of the work of mafia obedience of certain officials in question, I had handed (to  the Prime Minister’s Office) a copy of the book (annotated  especially for him) to the attention of Mr. Jettou, who has since become Prime Minister. But, unlike my congratulatory note (from Switzerland, where I was working for a few years for a US Audit Firm) for his appointment by His Majesty King Mohammed VI as Minister of the Interior, to which Mr. Jettou had replied cordially, there was never a follow-up or an echo after the delivery to his services of my aforementioned book-indictment.

Regarding the Report-indictment of the Court of Auditors, chaired by Mr. Jettou, it seems that Mr. President revisits, in this work, practices and behaviors of ONSSA services which are, in short, in the right line practices of their predecessors of the Repression of Frauds, that is to say outside the law in force on which these officials are supposed to watch and that they have always trespassed knowingly (see below). This being the case, Mr. Jettou has always been perceived as a serious and trustworthy Manager. There is therefore reason to believe that he was serious about kind of transfer of competency he told us about in 1996. But to date, that is twenty-five years later, that has not happened. The most reasonable conclusion is that there are resistance centers in the Moroccan state services that are fiercely opposed to that choice. What is probable, even if no one dares to speak of it, is that these resistances must be extremely strong and assumed by influential senior officials within the Government Mechanics.

Now, we would like to relate just two examples from our archives to illustrate how ONSSA and / or the LOARC (Official Laboratory for Analysis and Chemical Research), which has a de facto monopoly on laboratory analysis of food products in Morocco, push the Tribunal to burning his fingers to allow them to pull the chestnuts from the fire for their benefit. In 1996, an importer of an alcoholic beverage was put in prison and  spent a year there, before the Casablanca Court of Appeal came to understand  (to which we have modestly contributed) of the deception of the LOARC documents – masterpiece of the charge file – and frees him. In this respect, the LOARC Bulletin of Analysis in question (in our archives), which is at odds with the intrinsic reality of the product, was either erroneous or fraudulent. But the director of LOARC who signed the Bulletin of Analysis was never worried one way or another. Today, twenty-five years after that case, a cargo of tea from China is still blocked at the port of Agadir since March 2018, a year and a half (http://alkhabir.org/en/onssa-in-ignorance-of-the-law/) following a coalition of procrastination between ONSSA and LOARC completed by submitting to the Tribunal by these people of adulterated documents in disregard of the requirement that everyone must abstain to submitting false documents to the Court! The officials of these state organisms had to know (it cannot be otherwise) that they did not have, at the beginning, any scientific or technical proof in accordance with the law to block that tea cargo. It is purely and simply an abject abuse of power. However, ONSSA continues to use and abuse delaying procedures with the apparent aim of exhausting the patience of the Administrative Tribunal of Agadir so, they probably think, the Court will stop the procedure or give them reason. But, contrary to the disturbed imagination of these controllers, foreign professionals understand well and know how to draw the consequences of this type of malpractices that aim to obscure the mediocrity of these people in their work. This results in that correct investors and serious businessmen are leaving us to go to another country and Morocco got to deal with peddlers instead. It is strange that we only meet this type of action in our country where officials without conscience at work, within ONSSA in particular, exhaust the efforts and the money of the State to serve purposes that have nothing to do with the higher goals that are traced to them by the supreme Authority of the state or with the regulation that frames their work. In so far as this mismanagement has always existed without a solution in sight, there is good reason to speak of State services acting with impunity in an area of ​​lawlessness. As we also understand, the report-indictment of the Court of Auditors contains elements that should reinforce this perception of the mediocrity of the work of ONSSA pending a solution to this Conundrum.

However, the work that can be done by ONSSA (there are nevertheless honest officials in this organization) that is useful for our country is not lacking and the President of the Court of Auditors is well placed to know it and to make it heard. As an example, Mr. Jettou played a leading role, being Prime Minister at the time of negotiations and the signing of the free trade agreement between the Kingdom of Morocco and the USA in 2006. The President is therefore well placed to inform on all the benefits that our country can reap for its population by guiding part of its export in that lucrative market on which our exporters enjoy very good competitive advantages over our competitors on the northern shore of the Mediterranean like Spain and Italy (http://alkhabir.org/en/fda-helping-african-agribusiness-smes/). Of course, for this purpose, a preliminary work must be done by the State through its dedicated organizations, ONSSA in first and foremost place, to open the eyes of our operators to the opportunities offered to us by the US market, especially since the promulgation of the FSMA (http://alkhabir.org/en/fsma-the-new-paradigm-of-preventive-control/). But, perhaps current ONSSA officials do not look favorably on this agreement, in which case we should ask them who they really work for?

In conclusion, we would say that Mr. Driss Jettou apparently could not influence the project of transferring activity of Quality Control to the private sector while he was serving on the Government. Let’s hope that its present indictment report will be heard as it should be to improve the services of this key ONSSA organization for the benefit of national operators and exporters in the Moroccan agri-food sector. And, also, to show the way forward, as His Majesty King Mohammed VI wishes, to other African countries, brothers and friends.

Africa/News

The CAP on the way to last rites

Posted on by Ahmed ESSADKI

The EU has, in more or less advanced projects, free trade agreements with many countries including Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay in the framework of Mercosur and with Canada and also Japan. The Bloc also has plans for new agreements with several other countries. The EU puts this type of agreement that it signs with third countries under the Label of Multilateralism and considers, in this respect that the bilateral agreements sought by the American Administration are contrary to the spirit of Multilateralism. This is one of many factors that exacerbate the already tense relationship between the two major transatlantic players in trade, diplomacy and the like (see below). The fact remains that the negotiations for this type of trade with the EU are complex and laborious. The agreement must indeed receive the favorable opinion of each of the 27 countries of the Bloc, then be submitted for ratification to about forty local parliaments before finishing before the EU parliament for validation and final signature. The procedure is therefore long and tortuous, can last for many years, and can be delayed or blocked by any one of the many activist groups in one country or another in the EU. The blockage can also come from the high authorities of a country following, for example, to quarrels of people as recently reported the international press about a dispute between the Presidents of France and Brazil. However, the noisiest European pressure groups are unquestionably the operators of the French agricultural sector who do not want to hear about any free trade agreement whatsoever that would call into question the privileges that these French activists have acquired since the creation of the single European market and the implementation of the CAP (Common Agricultural Policy).

With regard to food, the European choice to strongly protect their agricultural sector, to guarantee their food autonomy, derives from their memories of the last Great War during which many European countries suffered from hunger. However, the privileges granted today to professionals in the EU agricultural sector may look like an easy distribution of money allowing breeders, sometimes with only a few dozen dairy cows, to live relatively comfortably, or even to afford paid holidays. But Germany, the first of the net contributors to the CAP that allows this generosity, seems to be tired of supporting these subsidies and no longer hides its annoyance at such donations that primarily benefit the Latin countries of the EU. It is highly likely that after the “Brexit”, and the exit of Great Britain from the EU, another big net contributor to the CAP, the Germans would be even more reluctant in the future to support the payments caused by the CAP. For the moment, France’s aggressive lobbying is helping to keep the EU agricultural subsidy system as it is. The French consider that the protection of the EU agricultural sector benefits all Europe including Germany. To understand this statement, it is worth remembering that, according to the standards set up by the Agricultural EU (synonymous with France Agricole), outside the  international regulations, African agricultural  products can be banned from entering the EU market even if they comply with the Codex Alimentarius. And in this case, as shown by various documented examples, our exporters concerned become the victims of well-established European speculators who buy their agricultural raw materials at ridiculous prices before routing them according to schemes developed on the EU market and resell them with substantial margins for the benefit of all European countries including Germany.

As far as the quarrel “Multilateralism VS Bilateralism” between the EU and the US is concerned, it is worth looking closely at these concepts to better analyze the EU’s confusing reasoning. The EU Commission, the “Government of 27”, indeed negotiates and signs free trade agreement treaties. Formally, it is a “bilateral act” between two entities as the case would be, for example, between the United States and a third country. But in the latter case, the federal law applies in exactly the same way to products imported from the third country regardless of the US port of entry. In the case of the EU regulation, the law can be interpreted and applied differently according to the understanding that the sovereign country of the EU (with the port of entry of the goods) wants to give it. There are examples that show that this understanding can differ widely from one country to another in the EU and ultimately result in economic and / or commercial shortfall for the exporting country of the product. Given that most of our products from West Africa enter the EU market via France, it follows that our understanding of the EU regulation merges with that of France. However, this is not the case for other countries that bring their products (the same ones) through different EU ports. Among the countries concerned by this case, there is the USA, for example, who has complained in the past about the different treatments of their exported products according to precisely the port of access of the goods to the EU market. On the other hand, although it is not obvious at first glance, the EU regulatory system for importing / distributing our African products is anything but innocent. According to well-designed mechanisms (not discussed in this article), the system makes it easier for European officials to accept the products they want them to access the single market. At the same time, it allows them to reject all others in ways that do not lend themselves to criticism. To put it simply, the protocol allows, for example, the closing of EU market “according to the rules of the art” to any African exporter who would have any inclination to search for other outlets for his products outside the EU.

To return to the US / EU tensions, there are some who think that the current transatlantic schism is too deep and very serious to be explained only by a trade dispute. The dispute would be more global and call into question, on all levels, the very foundations of international relations as they were posed after the last Great War. At the time, the IMF, the World Bank, the WTO and other international organizations that organized country-to-country relations at the commercial, economic, diplomatic and other levels were born. The countries each had a place and right to express their point of view and, if necessary, to sanction a decision by granting it a vote. This scheme, conceived and validated at that time by the United States, was relatively simple and consecrated the omnipotence of the United States which had, given its means and capabilities, pre-eminence over each of the countries of the globe taken individually. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, and German reunification, the European countries defended the project and obtained the EU’s status equivalent to that of a sovereign state with the flag, anthem, embassies and diplomatic representations. By doing so, they apparently took the US unawares and, as a result, they disrupted all the rules and practices followed until then at the level of international regulatory bodies. By this sleight of hand, the voice of the EU has become more prominent at WTO, IMF, Codex Alimentarius and elsewhere. In a way, Europeans are now imposing on Americans the obligation to compromise on anything with the EU at the level of each international regulator. In this respect, when, a few years ago, the Americans adopted a position in the IMF which was contrary to that of the EU on the Greek debt, the Europeans, Germany in the front row, raised the threat of setting up a parallel IMF. It would seem, then, that Germany, which lost the military war an eternity ago, has come back, draped this time with the timely cover of the EU, in order to take its revenge economically and commercially. For Uncle Sam, this new German-French-European paradigm is simply above anything the Americans would be willing to tolerate.

The Americans will most likely win the fight against the EU Bloc. Also, there is no longer any doubt that the future of the CAP, which is nearing its end, is behind that organism now. Indeed, many countries that want a free trade agreement with the EU are more interested in German technology than in farm products from France. But now that the Americans have, in the wake of the trade war with China, put the turbo to weaken the German economy, France wants to believe in the opportunity of its leadership on the EU. This Franco-German quarrel is just beginning but will surely take with it what is left of the CAP system. What is also likely is that the current EU standards will remain in place for the foreseeable future and will continue to negatively impact the export of our African agri-food resources to the EU market. If Africa wants to change things, and she better do it, the Acfta (African Continental Free Trade Area) should prioritize the implementation of African standards backed by Codex Alimentarius as soon as possible.

Expertise/News

Agricultural EU to the test of free trade agreements

Posted on by Ahmed ESSADKI

President Trump‘s statement last Friday, mentioning the superiority of Californian wines over French ones, will certainly be a milestone. So far, the Americans have been content to defend their agri-food products, of which wine is a part, in the face of the repeated beating of the Agricultural EU (synonymous with Agricultural France). Before, the goal was for the US to say, in short, that their products, prepared in accordance with the principles of sanitary safety the most stringent, as recognized by the WTO, were just as good as the products of Agricultural France. But it seems that this way of communicating has been highly snubbed by the European leaders concerned. In that case, according to the adage “the best defense is the attack”, the American President, this time, increased pressure on French agri-food in making fun of French wine, the most emblematic of French products for export. The French are furious. They sell tens of millions of bottles of wine and spirits annually on the American market and as many, if not more, elsewhere in the world. For their part, the British, who enjoy wine but do not grow grapes on their island, may have received President Trump‘s comment as a wink that they will not miss wine after Brexit. But, for those who saw the French cult movie of the mid-seventies The Wing or the Thigh, the declaration of the American President must make “turn in his grave” the legendary actor, the late Louis de Funès.

Still on the chapter “Who does better than the other”, the Germans, supported by the large number of Americans living in the Federal Republic of Germany at that time, have consolidated, for decades, the myth of “Made in Germany “and exporting their machine tools worldwide, cars in the first place. The US must probably consider that it has contributed to the worldwide spread of the credibility of the “Made in Germany” of the post-war period but that it has been badly paid back (see below). Just as yesterday (Thursday), the US ambassador to Berlin, Richard Grenell, did not take gloves to remind the Germans of that fact. France, for its part, with the help of the Anglo-Saxon countries who come, since long ago, as tourist to have a good time, has built an equivalent myth around its local products whose wine occupies a privileged place. Having done that, the French took care to build, with cunning and address, all kinds of merits that they attribute themselves to their agri-food products, the wine in first place, that they spread everywhere on the planet and that the film evoked above summarizes in a subtle way. Many French organoleptic standards and expertise of all kinds, more or less esoteric, are advanced to support these marketing efforts. This, of course, does not detract from France’s contribution to universal gastronomy (see: http://alkhabir.org/en/useful-french-legacy-to-morocco/). However, we must remember that Italy (Rome) preceded France in the art of winemaking and remains to this day the leading producer and the largest exporter of wine and has very great wines appreciated throughout the world.

Germany’s approach to promoting “Made in Germany” for their industrial products has been comparable to that of the French for their wine.

But these efforts began during the period that the French call the thirty glorious (fifties, sixties and seventies) of the last century, which also constituted years of strong tension of the US with the Soviets. At that time, Europe in general, France and Germany in particular, benefited in many ways from America’s interest in being helped in its struggle against communist countries during the Cold War. French art, gastronomy, culture, theater, music and films, among others, were proliferating worldwide and made headlines alongside international events such as the books of the soviet opponent Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and others. That time has been gone forever now and the world has changed a lot since then. At the risk of a “military war” apprehended during the cold war a real “trade war” followed and, in this new struggle, the EU appears to be an adversary of the US that may be even tougher than China. In this respect, all observations show today that Americans have become aware of the challenge that the EU poses to their business internationally. As a result, everything suggests that America is working diligently to demystify one after another the more or less sophisticated, but wobbly, pillars on which continental Europe has chosen to project anew its renewed power in the world, primarily on our African continent. For example, the Euro at its launch was, according to its designers, to supplant the Dollar (see under: la guerre des matières premières) as the first international currency. The containment (allegedly) of Uncle Sam of this ambition, supposedly conceived by Late Helmut Kohl and François Mitterrand, caused that, twenty years after its introduction, the exchanges made in Euro represent less than 10 percent and are concentrated first in Africa / EU trade. In this spirit, the US / EU frictions of the last thirty years have almost pushed Germany, as the leading figure of the power of commercial Europe, into the arms of China in sign of probable distrust to America.  Germany has even begun, a few years ago, a rapprochement in fanfare with the Middle Kingdom. It is possible that these gestures have irritated to the highest point the American part and be related    with the subsequent discovery, on American soil, of the Volkswagen illegal activities dealing with the “Dieselgate“. The scandal of the fraudulent engines in question was then extended to vehicles of other German brands. As a result, the scrupulousness of the “Made in Germany” is now severely damaged and begins to negatively affect the Myth of the efficiency of the “Made in Germany” that was universally accepted until today. Also, it is possible that the recession on which Germany stands right now is just the harbinger of many other setbacks that Uncle Sam would be simmering for the future. On this chapter, President Trump has said he is ready to decide on the application of additional taxes on cars and spare parts imported from Germany before the end of this year already.

Seeing the traditional markets, first of all that of the US, are slipping out of their   hands one after the other, the EU then embarked on a frantic race for the signing of free trade agreements everywhere.  But, considering this entire transatlantic ruckus, it is now circulating in circles of the Agricultural EU, stories on the mode of conspiracy theory. For example, the free trade agreement signed with Canada, the CETA (Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement), would be just a Trojan horse developed by the Americans to flood the EU market with their agri-food products.  And the free trade agreement signed with Mercosur (Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay) would be even worse because there will be added non-compliant products risking the health of the European consumer. On the same tone, while the EU says it is ready to work seriously (sic!) with ACFTA (African Continental Free Trade Area) in the future, we do not know for the moment whether our future agri-food products would be acceptable to the European consumer.

In reality, the agricultural trade balance of Agricultural France is currently in surplus with Africa only. Multiplying free trade agreements will not produce miracles in this regard. So, it may be high time for the EU Bloc to realize that apart from any other considerations, the CAP (Common Agricultural Policy) has developed in the Agricultural EU a sickly addiction to easy money and,  at the same time, a decline in profitability and a harmful neglect of the principles of competition that underlie international work. Yet it is an illustrious French character and great poet, Monsieur Jean de la Fontaine, who, in his poem «the plowman and his children“, instructed his fellow citizens “That work is a treasure“. Perhaps it would be useful for Agricultural France to come back to this great sage.

Africa/News

The imbroglio of the Agricultural EU

Posted on by Ahmed ESSADKI

The statistics of 2018, unveiled recently, showed that, for the first time in recent history, France has become a net importer of food. The CAP (Common Agricultural Policy) has finally benefited other EU countries which, like Poland (products of plant origin) and Spain (products of animal origin), have taken EU market shares from it.  Although French officials continue to claim the best quality of their products over other competitors, and French standards higher than those approved by EFSA (European Food Safety Authority), European consumers buy where they find the best quality/price ratio and the impression is that ratio is moving away more and more from the “Made in France“. This behavior of EU citizens is reinforced by the continuing decline in the purchasing power of Europeans as a consequence, in particular, of the decline of EU exports due to  lack of competitiveness of the Bloc in the face of international competition. Finally, the reasons for the decline of Agricultural France (synonymous in this article of Agricultural EU) are numerous and varied (see below) which all go in the direction of an irreversible diminution of the influence of the Agricultural EU.  At the same time, it is an opportunity that the ACFTA (African Continental Free Trade Area) should take advantage of to rebalance our continent’s trade relations with our partners in the globalized market in the future.

We go back a bit to briefly trace the path that led the Agricultural EU to play the leading roles in the global agri-food sector before forcing, soon, the EU to meet the same standards as other operators in the globalized agri-industrial sector.

In the aftermath of the Second World War, two different blocks of interests were formed. On the one hand, the Comecon regrouping the USSR (Union of Soviet Socialist Republics), Eastern European countries and other communist countries elsewhere in the world and, on the other hand, the United States of America and the countries of Western Europe as main ally. Each bloc had its own specific rules for trading in their respective markets. The United States then regarded the Communist Bloc as an existential risk for America and sought to contain it by any means. To this end, to cement a strong alliance with its European allies, the Americans have apparently agreed to make some concessions. For example, not interfere in the affairs of Gaullist France, a recalcitrant ally, on the African continent. Since then, France would consider this circumstantial “tacit US acquiescence” as its privilege that it shares with its partners in the EU. In this respect, a little like the Comecon’s internal market, made hermetic to Western trade  in those days by what it was called an “Iron Curtain“, France Agricole tried hard to take over the African market by a “Curtain of Standards ” and arranged to have them approved by the EU regulator. As a result, it has become very difficult for other countries in the world to trade with the countries of our continent without going through the “EU standards”. This status quo could have continued for generations to come if the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the erosion of the Soviet empire, had not allowed reshuffling the cards. For example, the US interest in a strong, and costly, partnership with Western Europe against the Soviets was no longer so relevant. With that, the Uncle Sam began, like the other world powers, to show more and more interest to trade directly with the African countries including also the countries of the Middle East. Regarding areas considered by Europeans as their private preserve, the Agricultural EU has mobilized accordingly to block the enthusiasm of Americans for trading in these areas. So, France Agricole did things in a structured and sustained way. First, it sensationalized all the agri-food practices of Americans that it considers to pose risks to the health of consumers. And the fact that the US won against these assertions before the WTO (World Trade Organization) has in no way discouraged French militancy. Then, since the nineties, the Agricultural EU has flooded African exporters with new specific requirements (standards outside the Codex Alimentarius) to respect in order to access the EU market. Moreover, non-compliance with these ‘standards’ leads to restrictions on the ‘offending’ operator’s export to the Community market. This is, considering that the EU is the main outlet for our African raw materials, a strong dissuasive argument for the operators of our continent. This may explain, among other things, why the promising Free Trade Agreement agreed between Morocco and the US fifteen years ago is still standing still.

It can be deduced from this observation that, despite their power and experience, the Americans have not been able to gain the upper hand over the arguments propagated by Agricultural EU to oppose the normal trade of many of US food products on the EU market. In addition, this propaganda of Agricultural EU greatly complicates the task for US food processors in penetrating food markets, like Africa, associated with that of the EU. It must also be said that the European argument in question evokes the fact that prices of “discredited” American food products are just as expensive as European ones. This to remove any financial interest for the European consumer for the “Made in USA“

But sometimes the solution comes from where you least expect it. Indeed, the EU has just signed a free trade agreement with Mercosur (Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay). The USA considers Latin America as their area of influence and, as far as food sector is concerned, the standards in force in the zone are of FDA obedience since always. Agricultural France is already advancing the arguments of “Beef with hormones” and “Chlorine Chicken” in order to block the ratification of the agreement concluded between Mercosur and the EU. But this time, Latin American products of animal origin, which are consumed all over the world, including Switzerland, have the quality / price ratio on their side, what most consumers in the EU are looking for.

In any case, Agricultural EU will now be caught between a rock and a hard place for completing the agreement with Mercosur. On the one hand the European consumer who seeks to buy at the best price / quality ratio will therefore favor Mercosur products. On the other hand, you have France Agricole, represented mainly by French farmers, relatively few in number, who are against Mercosur food products. Indeed, French farmers are less accustomed to principles of competitiveness and, worse, have been made very dependent on CAP grants. Beautiful battles in perspective and, once is not custom, it is the Americans who will be in the boxes as spectators. They probably will like it

As far as we are concerned, our continental leaders would do well to follow closely how Agricultural EU will end this imbroglio and draw the necessary conclusions from them. That will help in discussions to come on the future of the Zleca in the face of an EU determined to keep our African market under their control.

Africa/Expertise

A continental FDA for Acfta

Posted on by Ahmed ESSADKI

Usually, we reserve the writings of this blog for the activities of the agri-food sector. For the purpose of this article, we join to our interest the Moroccan pharmaceutical sector, which we know, and African on which we have echoes. The reason is that we collaborated and / or worked with this sector for many years first in Lausanne (Switzerland) as an Assistant at the Faculty of Medicine, then in Basel (Switzerland), as a junior researcher in one of the largest multinationals, and here in Casablanca as a Scientific and Administrative Attaché to one of the local groups. Now, there is the fact that the local press reports, in recent times, that the Moroccan pharmaceutical sector is in great depression and accumulates for a while blunders like stockouts, the lack of essential drugs for patients and other failures we have not seen in the last thirty-five years. Elsewhere in Africa, the international press speaks of cases of mediocre drugs (substandard), generics of antibiotics in particular, prescribed to patients and, instead of curing; the products have precipitated the death of patients (see below). At the time of the entry into force of the Acfta (African Continental Free Trade Area), the subject has attracted our attention for this reflection which is meant to be educational without too much focus on the names neither of the drugs decried nor on pharmaceutical laboratories incriminated nor on the names of implicated officials of the private or the public.

With regard to Morocco, the active encouragement of metropolitan France, at the turn of independence, for the birth of a local productive sector of medicines may seem enigmatic at first glance. In fact, the pharmaceutical industry, more than most industries, is a highly capitalistic profession that depends on a dynamic Research / Development activity. At the time we are talking about, only the Faculty of Science of Rabat was relatively operational (could import some laboratory rats for example). Moreover, apart from alcohol and sugar, where the demand of the sector could partly be satisfied by local production, all other needs (raw materials, consumables, equipment, materials, know-how, etc.) had to be imported from metropolitan France. Indeed, considering that the colonizer had taken care to lock by regulations and standards (some are still in force), the activity of the national health sector in his favor, it was more than recommended to import the supplies listed of the metropolis. And, to the extent that France is not known to produce on its soil a good part of the articles mentioned (which it itself imports from elsewhere), the purchase of these tools for the Moroccan market from intermediaries French made them particularly expensive. As a result, drug prices in Morocco were relatively much more expensive to patients compared to their costs elsewhere in the world. But, French partners have found the opportunity to draw copiously from the pockets of Moroccan manufacturers and paying nothing to the local administration. It is probable that metropolitan France acted in other countries of French-speaking Africa in the same way it did in Morocco.

Now, if the health risks can concern both foodstuffs and pharmaceuticals, the potential dangers are not of the same degree on the health of the consumer or patient. In this perspective, the management of the threats in question must be adapted to the type of risk conveyed by the taking of a food on one side and, on the other, the possible consequences of a prescription drug (see below). For example, in the case of a foodborne infection, the chances are high that a few hours, or a few days, after eating a meal, symptoms (common to food-borne illnesses) such as fever, vomiting, headaches and others come out as warning signs of more serious health problems to come. This can, in a way, help for taking the lead and seeking appropriate medical care. In the case of a falsified medicine, the effect can be much more pernicious because you have to take into consideration the “placebo effect”. This means that at the idea of receiving a prescribed medicine, patients may, temporarily, feel better even if the product is faked. Under these conditions, if the drug administered is fraudulent and its deleterious effect is revealed only much later (carcinogenic and other products), the patient may have the feeling (placebo effect) of momentary healing when in fact disastrous effects, under the action of the defective drug, incubate in his body without his knowledge to emerge at a time when it will be too late to remedy the problem. For this reason, the quality and rigor of drug control is more pressing here than in many other areas of activity.

In this respect, the available data suggest that some generic drug manufacturers, mainly in China and India, define the Quality / Control criteria according to the country in which they intend to export the pharmaceutical product. The least careful manufacture (reduction of the content of active ingredient for example) and the laxest control (Falsified Analysis Bulletins) are reserved for products destined for our African countries. Apparently, these mafia-type professionals are well informed of the seriousness (or permissiveness) of the quality control system of the country of their interest so to not take risk “inconsiderate” for their business. This explains in particular the recurring under dosage results that are found in antibiotics imported into Africa and which seriously damages (disaster of bacterial resistance) the health of our fellow citizens.  At the same time, this observation correlates with the lack of rigor of institutional quality control in many of our African countries, which is regularly criticized by non-governmental organizations. It is important to emphasize that these same generic drug manufacturers carry out correct manufacturing operations and rigorous and unfailing controls on the batches of products that they send, for example, for American market which is considered the most severe in the world for verification of the quality of pharmaceuticals. Major global pharmaceutical companies regularly confirm that the passing of the FDA quality control tests significantly improves the chances of successful commercialization of a drug in the international market.

But not all countries can afford Quality control structures equivalent to those of FDA. For example, the information made public after the Benfluorex-Mediator disaster in France showed that besides the high cost of setting up pharmaceuticals control structures in France, those laboratories are far from easy to manage. Nevertheless, the result of the disaster of the aforementioned pharmaceutical, with hundreds (even thousands) of deaths and more still to come, remains unforgivable for families victims of the catastrophe. It is also deduced that if the management of such pharmaceutical control structures is considered expensive and complex for a large country like France, the effort might be far beyond the possibilities of an individual African country. At the same time, to dispense with the control of local or imported pharmaceuticals is not an option either. Otherwise, our African countries may become places for recycling poor products (substandard) or even simply outdated.

In the past, European countries have resorted to FDA assistance to help them rebuild their control structures destroyed in the last major war. One idea would be for our future leaders of Acfta to open a dialogue with FDA (US Federal Agency for Food and Drug Control) with the wish to benefit from same kind of assistance the European have been given before. There is no reason to believe the FDA would refuse them a service it has given to another continent in the past.

Expertise/News

Internationalization of African trade

Posted on by Ahmed ESSADKI

The (asymmetric) rules applied to trade with the countries of the African continent have, for the most part, been posed and maintained by one or other of the EU countries, ex-colonizers of Africa. From the economic and commercial point of view, yesterday and today, they aim to keep our countries firmly attached to the Europeans and their control over our wealth. In this respect, the “European market” can be understood as the “French market” in many countries in French-speaking Africa. We refer in this article to the case of Morocco, but the situation may be comparable in other countries of the continent. For example, some 30 years ago, most of the national fleet was made up of French-branded vehicles. Exporters of comparable Asian vehicles have had to make a huge effort to access the Moroccan market. Initially, they had to accept, among other things, to pay 10% more taxes than their competitors from the EU. Still today, Europeans continue to enjoy of great inherited and preserved, colonial-era benefits like better locations for their showrooms, or well-oiled import and distribution circuits and the service of an administration mostly acquired to their cause, etc.

In addition to vehicles, some non-European investors have successfully established themselves in niche markets such as aeronautics and wind power. But investment in the agri-food industry, a key sector of the national economy, where Morocco enjoys a potential for very favorable comparative advantages, in natural and other resources, is still dominated by French-European operators (French or other European). In addition to the knowledge of our “habits and customs”, the “residual colonial” authority (the string of organizations working for the EU), which has eyes everywhere, has put all its weight in locking the sector with regulations and laws that are in force until today. The “merit” goes to some broken arms, among our officials of the ministries of supervision, who indulge in the dirty work of “copy / paste” and the maintenance in application, against all common sense, of regulatory texts sometimes set up at era of colonization to serve the interests of the colonizer. The essence of the laws in question is to perpetuate the types of exchanges that largely favor French-Europeans to the detriment of other interested investors. In other words, the regulatory texts as a whole aim to maintain the importation of finished products “Made in EU” (Made in France), paid dearly in Euro, and the export at low prices of raw materials sold to Europe. The example of the free trade agreement signed between Morocco and the US for almost fifteen years, and so far a dead letter, illustrates how much Franco-Europeans are omnipotent in our national market. The multitude of tools (regulatory and practices) used in this way are discussed in other articles of this blog. In these circumstances, a non-European investor wishing to engage in one component or another of our agri-food sector, and who wants to maintain its presence, has had, so far, no choice but to take a Franco-European partner. In this respect, the review of operators who count in the Moroccan agri-food sector, all segments combined shows that this rule has indeed been widely followed.

Also, among the companies mentioned above, which are well established on our national market, some emphasize certification documents and / or quality control that are edited and signed abroad (our archives).  To our knowledge, the Kingdom of Morocco has not signed mutual recognition agreements with EU countries for this type of service. So, the unlawful validation of such documents for use on Morocco market is a flagrant disregard of the EU for our institutions and our national sovereignty. In our opinion, this deception, verifiable at any time, must first be attributed to the mediocrity of the work of some officials (who have done their time) of the ONSSA (National Office of Sanitary Safety Food), the body of guardianship over our agri-food sector, which, de facto, contravenes the regulations in force in Morocco when it is supposed to ensure its sound application. The available data show that such colonial-type documents circulate widely elsewhere in Africa, thus conveying the same type of disregard for local regulations. If, despite its great wealth, Africa has the greatest number of poor people in the world, the responsibility now lies, in our view, with those of our lazy leaders, in Morocco and elsewhere, even more than the past actions of colonial leaders.

In this respect, His Majesty King Mohammed VI has emphasized on many occasions Morocco’s solidarity with other friendly African countries and the duty our country has to contribute to the co-development of our African continent. Regarding the agri-food sector, our opinion is that before addressing such a program of assistance to others, Morocco should relinquish the type of civil servant mentioned above to regain credibility with countries that wish entering the globalized market without restrictive rules of colonial essence.

Apart from this, the EU must realize that the time of exclusivity they have had on the African Trade / Economy is now behind them. The internationalization of African trade that has started is irreversible. In addition to other countries like China, Japan, India, Russia, Turkey, the Gulf countries and others, there is now the USA which is interested in trading directly with our Continent. In this regard, the review of the writings and other announcements of EU officials in the media recently let appear an EU which has lost its haughtiness. Europeans are now posing as victims of what they call “sharks”  which want harming the UE like China, Russia and, a first, the United States. Instead of recognizing their mistakes about the suffering and looting they inflicted on Africa, and compensate for it, they persist in a soporific speech by promising the entire continent a free trade agreement with the quick creation of ten million jobs. One must have fallen on one’s head to believe such nonsense promises assimilating the creation of a job to preparing a jar of yoghurt! From memory of a historian, they have impoverished this continent and plundered its resources, and now they promise to do in five years what they have refused to do in four centuries.

In fact, why should the other powers would want harming the Europeans? It would be good for them to tell us. It must be remembered that, apart from Germany, in reprieve for the moment, the other countries of the European continent have difficulty in exporting anything competitively. Maybe the powers in question find that the Europeans does not have the means for their policy and that it is high time for the EU to let African trade breathe better!