By Savithri Rodrigo
Korbongou, Togo (Commonwealth Union)_Togo is the world’s 21st largest exporter of raw cotton amounting to USD 63 million in exports in 2020, exporting primarily to China, Malaysia, Vietnam, Pakistan and India. In a bid to grow the share of exports of this commodity which has significant promise given the rapidly growing apparel trade around the world, Togo launched a cotton commercialization campaign covering the years of 2022-23 to mobilise logistics for seamless efficiency in the value chain.
One of the biggest challenges the country faces in getting the raw cotton to its final destination is in collection, which has also delayed payments to cotton farmers. The commercialization campaign therefore will not just ensure that the supply chain will be seamless but also that farmers will be speedily paid, with no delay. The current cotton haul is just over 50,000 tonnes and is sold for CFA300 per kilogram.
A Singaporean food and agri-business enterprise Olam acquired Togo’s cotton industry but has made little difference to productivity or output. The last season netted even less than the output the season before of 66,000 tonnes, almost half the expected output of 130,000 tonnes.
With the fastest growing export markets for raw cotton being China, Bangladesh and Saudi Arabia, Togo is intent on capitalizing on the emerging paradigms, empowering not just its hardworking cotton farmers but also augmenting one of its top ten exports and the contribution it makes in foreign exchange to the country.
The once flourishing cotton industry which carried the moniker “white gold” in the West African region, contributes only 1 to 4.3% to Togo’s GDP while employing 500,000 directly and indirectly from a population of eight million. The privatization move was a bid to revitalize this strategic industry which unfortunately continued to see drops in production in successive years primarily due to poor quality cotton seed and floods in the north of the country. The drop in production and resulting loss of income has forced farmers to turn to farming other crops including soybeans and corn.
