A Quote by Eleni Zaude Gabre-Madhin
Like its agriculture, Africa's markets are highly under-capitalized and inefficient. We know from our work around the continent that transaction costs of reaching the market, and the risks of transacting in rural, agriculture markets, are extremely high. In fact, only one third of agricultural output produced in Africa even reaches the market.
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It is hard for me to understand why we tolerate so many barriers to agriculture trade when America is the No. 1 producer of agriculture products. I think opening up markets - more markets for agricultural sales is a very high priority for us.
On the one hand, you have markets such as Singapore and Thailand, with an extremely strong inbound booker market and a well-developed tourism industry. You also have markets that are just opening up to tourists, like Myanmar, that have massive growth potential and then markets that are extremely fragmented within themselves such as Indonesia.
Over the past three decades, markets and market thinking have been reaching into spheres of life traditionally governed by non-market norms. As a result, we've drifted from having a market economy to becoming a market society.
There is a bit of a problem with the match between derivative securities markets and the primary markets. We have long ago instituted principles, essentially high margin requirements, to prevent certain instabilities in the stock market, and I think they're basically correct. The trouble is that there's a linkage, let's say, between something like the stock market and the index futures markets, and the fact that the margin requirements are very different, for example, played some role in the October '87 crash.
You can fit two United States and maybe a third one into the entire continent of Africa, but on a map we make the entire continent of Africa look like the size of the United States, which is why a lot of people don't know that Africa is a continent. They think it's a country because it looks as big as we do.
You cannot just depend on the market, because the market will say: China needs oil; China needs coal; China needs whatever, and Africa has got all these things in abundance. And we go there and get them, and the more we develop the Chinese economy, the larger the manufacturing is, the more we need global markets - sell it to the Africans which indeed might very well destroy whatever infant industries are trying to develop on the continent. That is what the market would do.
African agriculture today is among, or is, the most under-capitalized in the world. Only seven percent of arable land in Africa is irrigated, compared to 40 percent in Asia.
Obviously, South Africa is our most important market, but we are also gradually increasing our presence throughout East and West as well as North Africa. It is a continent with a lot of potential which we plan to tap into.
I'm extremely positive about investment in Africa. Africa has a wonderful climate, wonderful people, and amazing possibilities. Africa has been called dark and hopeless, but today it is neither of these. Africa is awakening. It's a huge market of almost a billion people with huge resources and a young population. It's the best place to invest.
Agriculture is not crop production as popular belief holds - it's the production of food and fiber from the world's land and waters. Without agriculture it is not possible to have a city, stock market, banks, university, church or army. Agriculture is the foundation of civilization and any stable economy.
Remember that banks aren't markets. The market is amoral. The market doesn't care who you are. You're a trade to the market. The market will sell you if they think you're riskier.
Let's not pretend we're in a global free market when it comes to agriculture. Every country protects, for good reason, its agricultural industries.
Our own objective is to make Africa overcome its difficulties, to make Africa a continent of hope, to make Africa a continent of the future, to make Africa a pillar of the world in which we live - not seen as a problem but seen as an opportunity.
Before you start trying to work out which direction the property market is headed, you should be aware that there are markets within markets.
After the First World War the economic problem was no longer one of production. It was the problem of finding markets to get the output of industry and agriculture dispersed and consumed.
As an integral part of the Department of Agriculture, the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service monitors our Nation's agriculture to protect against agricultural pests and diseases.
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