Publications
AZPA Newsletter!
UNITAD in 2004 declared that “it is very difficult to reduce poverty in an LDC if exports are not growing, or are growing very slowly, and if import capacity is severely constrained”. Very poor countries experience a number of interlocking domestic vicious circles that serve to perpetrate a circle of economic stagnation and mass poverty. Integration with the world economy through trade, investment, technology imports, financial flows and movement of people and ideas can greatly help countries to break out of these vicious circles.
However, for export expansion to be able to reduce poverty, experts say, the real export growth must exceed 5% per annum. Secondly, it is believed that manufactures exporters have higher success rate at reducing poverty than commodity or mineral exporters.
Africa Zero Poverty Association (AZPA) adapted the ITC export-led poverty reduction programme as its key strategic policy. The EPEP has two main pillars:
a. The development of the entrepreneurial capacity of the poor with regard to exporting.
b. Linking that capacity to proven export market opportunities.
EPEP projects focus on five sectors based on analysis of demand in regional or international markets and the employment and income generation potential of these sectors. The sectors are:
1. Agricultural products (fresh and processed)
2. Textiles (fibres and clothing)
3. Animal skin (leather and leather goods)
4. Light manufacturing
5. Community-based tourism.
AZPA hence works with SMEs in these sectors with a view to helping them in:
1. Identifying winning products and growth markets - Projects are selected on the basis of the growth potential of the product in question, and the existence of a stable demand for the product. An attempt is made to identify products that can mobilize dormant or underutilized production capacities by adapting them to the specifications of a clearly identified product-market demand.
2. Product development, product adaptation, standards and quality - The products to be exported must be competitive in international markets and meet international product requirements. AZPA seeks co-operation with bigger organizations like ITC, NEPC, etc to help in providing technical assistance for this purpose, i.e. assistance in this stage could involve aiding producers in seeking ISO Certification, technological support in production and adaptation of the product to the market, or assistance in quality control and packaging. Other examples of assistance are aiding producers with trial orders before a large scale export order is made to identify and correct any potential problems.
3. Selecting and organizing poor producers - AZPA has worked extensively in the area of ensuring they are organized in some form of co-operative to ensure they achieve a sufficient scale to produce, market and distribute their products. We are currently feverishly searching out ways of facilitating their training in marketing, producing and entrepreneurship.
4. Selecting the right product markets for the producer organization – A key aspect is the ability of the productive organization (producers) to sustain production under competitive condition, as well as its ability to meet changing competitive demands. Attention is paid to the strength of the export in international markets.
5. Linking producers to buyers - Another crucial element of the EPEP is the linking of Nigerian producers to international buyers. AZPA works to match-make Nigerian producers with international buyers.
6. Finance and Credit - AZPA works in ensuring self-sufficient credit services for EPEP projects.
7. Managerial Training - The development of appropriate managerial skills with a view to making poor producers self-sufficient in the long-run is a key issue addressed via training. AZPA seeks partnership with other organizations like NEPC to ensure this.
8. Support Services - AZPA does a needs’ assessment at the onset of the project and carries it throughout the project to ensure every support needed is provided to ensure success.
9. Gender - We encourage women participation.
10. Environment - We also encourage the production of environmentally friendly products.
ADVOCACY
In advocacy AZPA aims to stimulate the supply, by the government of Nigeria, of conditions conducive for economic growth, employment, household income and consumption expansion. The consensus in development economics is that basic infrastructure is sine quanon for economic development and poverty eradication. Hence the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) noted that “Meeting the imperious social needs in sub-Saharan Africa is actually a precondition of economic development: the inability to cross thresholds such as basic standards of healthcare, agric productivity and core infrastructure block the regions’ transaction to sustained growth”. This report went on to hinge any hope of success in poverty reduction on successes in supplying basic infrastructure. It noted this would deliver an effective GDP growth impulse of about 1.5 percent per year. Noting the importance of good governance for poverty reduction, we mainstreamed advocacy in our strategic plan.
An interview with Chris Johnson, pet-lover and entrepreneur
THE CORRUPTION MENACE
Corruption is the albatross of our nation. The nation’s nemesis and its obituary. It has been the barrier to the effective mobilization of the nation’s resources – tax and revenue corruption – and also to the effective allocation and utilization of these resources embezzlement, graft, etc; drifting prized resources away from the activities that are necessary for our sustainable development.
A recent report noted that six Niger Delta Governors squandered a whooping five trillion naira between 1999 and 2007 with nothing to show for it. The roads and drainage infrastructure are still antiquarian, the taps dry, power unavailable, and their citizens miserable. Little wonder at the close of 2007 the EFCC said it has cases against 35 State Governors. In the statement, its former Chairman Malam Nuhu Ribadu, noted that “eighty percent of Nigeria’s money has gone to waste” over twelve billion dollars are taken off Nigeria’s coffers in theft every year.
For this reason AZPA decided to start its advocacy work in the area of the war on corruption.
After studying the nature and forms of corruption in Nigeria, we have come to the conclusion in concordance with Transparency International (TI) that immunity for senior political office holders is the chief policy-related cause of corruption in Nigeria.
Hence, we undertook the Write-Your-Rep Advocacy project focused on a demand for the removal of the immunity clause (section 308) from the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
