How Ugandans can improve their status as international hawkers

The late Dr Samson Kisekka, a former vice president of Uganda, provoked laughter and admonition for describing Ugandan businessmen as “international hawkers”. Two decades after Kisekka died, however, Ugandan businessmen remain vendors of items produced in other countries.
All our businessmen do is rent warehouses and important factory rejects and such junk, then fly first class after making a killing off Ugandans, who have no alternatives. I do not know the difference between a vendor and hawker, but to me, the group is not very different from street children in Kampala, who sell sweets, brooms, newspapers and other merchandise.

It should preoccupy us immensely how we get out of this quandary. I intend to propose one way in this article.
President Museveni reckons that Africans are the most travelled race in the world; that you will find an African in any corner of the world. There is a Ugandan in nearly every major capital on earth. These Ugandans and the embassies and consulates we have around the world are ready assets that we can use to vend Ugandan products.
And, of course, all of us know, we are an agriculture-based economy. Whether we make success as a country will be heavily dependent on how well and fast we transform the agriculture sector. And, of course, we cannot transform our agriculture unless we find a way to sell our products in rich markets around the world.

This is why we have to profitably use our readily available labour, combined with the right mix of technology, to produce what we can sell to the rest of the world. The question of increasing production has been grappled with for a long time now, and currently we have Operation Wealth Creation in which the government has expressed commitment to invest a lot of money to turn around production in the agriculture sector. Of course, a number of challenges remain and many will argue that we need to improve in the area of production. I agree.
As we struggle to improve our agricultural production, I propose that we focus our energies to think about how we can sell abroad much of what we produce. I propose a paradigm shift in that regard, which I trust can be achieved by using our cousins on kyeyo to market our agricultural produce, much which should as standards improve in agriculture will be produced by our “educated” school leavers.

Take this example: If someone was growing pineapples and the only market available to him is Kampala, the scope is clearly narrow. However, if a group of people was to be told to produce a specific pineapple with the right size and stage of ripeness and our kyeyo cousins set up reception centres in different cities around the world, soon fresh Ugandan pineapples would be on the supermarket shelves in London, Vancouver, Tokyo, Sydney, name them. This opportunity can feed in as a possible linkage as we debate to recreate Uganda Airlines.
The fresh pineapple produced in Luweero will be consumed in far-away cities with all its aroma, taste and uniqueness. This can apply to bananas, ginger, vegetables, veal, parked meat, smoked fish, name it. What matters is to get the right packaging materials and ready reception centres all over the world.

The government has encouraged coffee production as the country aims to sell 40 tons of coffee per year, which is wonderful. But my father sold coffee seeds. I am 62 years old and I also sell coffee seeds. I don’t want my son to also sell coffee beans at 62 years of age. Something has to change.
If my son grows coffee on four acres and sends it to his cousin in Moscow who knows something about roasting and packaging and then sells it as instant coffee, they will have beaten the cartel system in the coffee sector that frustrated Andrew Rugasira with his Good African Coffee. We need to learn from his mistakes.

If we send our produce in small quantities to different cities and brand them well, the consumers in Moscow, London and other capitals will appreciate them for their uniqueness. We tell ourselves that we have the best pineapple in the world. And it is true. Let’s throw it in people’s faces all over the world, clearly branded as ‘Uganda Pineapple’.
We should also do the same with our coffee, ginger and other products. Very soon, people all over the world will crave for what we produce. We are a unique country in terms of climate and other natural gifts; that we know. We can use this to cultivate a niche for ourselves and force the world to look for what we produce. That is how foo-foo, a West African yam/cassava, Indian cuisine and Chinese restaurants circulate worldwide.

Once we get our thinking straight and define the strategy, you will see how our talented young people will work the Internet to connect our every village that produces a unique product to the world. We will still remain a hawking nation, but in a much better sense. And we will have happier people.

Maj Gen Pecos Kutesa is an MP representing UPDF and head of Centre for Doctrine Synthesisation and Development.

[email protected]