The Togolese parliament adopted last Thursday two bills that redefine the attributes of the National Agency for Cybersecurity.

Concretely, the first bill covers updated texts that clarify the attributes of the Agency and redefine its strategic directions in cybersecurity in relation to the powers of the Regulatory Authority for Electronic Communications and Posts (ARCEP), regarding the accreditation of trust service providers.

Details were also provided on the role of liaison and collaboration of the ANCy with foreign partners at the regional level.

The second bill "concerns the amendment of the law on biometric identification of individuals in Togo. It aims, like the first bill, to make digital technology a vector of growth and productivity for both the public and private sectors," according to the national assembly. 

Cina Lawson, the minister of the digital economy, believes that this bill will help the State face security challenges and better fight cybercrime.

In 2018, Togo took legislative measures aligning with its efforts to fight cybercrime. These were reinforced by the “2025 Digital Togo Strategy.”

Esaïe Edoh

President Gnassingbé is in Doha for the second Annual Economic Forum of Qatar. According to the Togolese presidency, he will be there from June 20 to 22. 

The leader and his peers will discuss issues like African economies’ recovery, investments, supply chain resilience, inflation and ways to tackle it, the energy transition, and digital economy. Togo will share its experience relative to economic resilience on this occasion.

On the sidelines of the forum, the Togolese leader and the Emir of Qatar Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani will meet and talk about the cooperation between their two countries.

The Qatar Economic Forum brings together several heads of state and government and investors to discuss strategies to address the most pressing challenges facing economies and ensure the equal resumption of post-Covid-19 growth. 

Esaïe Edoh

In Togo, the Hospital Management Company (SOGEHP), in charge of the operation of the Dogta-Lafiè hospital (formerly called Saint-Pérégrin) launched on Friday 17 June, a capital opening and fundraising operation. 

The capital opening aims to diversify 49.975% of the operator’s shareholding, raising CFA25.01 billion in the process. However, the SOGEHP will remain the main shareholder in the project which is steered by Togo’s National Social Security Fund, CNSS. 

Target: CFA15 billion in private placements    

Concretely, 10,000 shares, at a unit cost of CFA1.5 million, will be sold, thus making a total of CFA15 billion. This will add to CFA10 billion contributed by the CNS and the SOGEHP’s share capital of CFA10 million. 

"It is a private placement that has been recommended for this operation and there is a minimum subscription of 50 shares that have been defined, which would make a minimum of 75 million FCFA per investor," the SOGEHP said, adding that "any individual or legal entity can subscribe, regardless of their place of residence.”

"Strengthen the contribution of the private sector"

For Gilbert Bawara, Minister of Labor and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the CNSS, the operation is an opportunity "to strengthen the contribution of the private sector not only to the economic dynamism" of the country but also "to position Lomé as a destination of choice in medical tourism." 

"Participatory governance and the quest for greater efficiency call for win-win cooperation. By joining this participatory financing, [economic operators will contribute to] ensuring the equipment of the hospital with an ultra-modern technical platform and to provide it with highly qualified medical staff," said Gilbert Bawara.

Improving the supply of health services and reducing medical evacuations

The Togolese government believes that once the project is operational, it will “serve a large part of the population, and, attract more people who were not used to going to the hospital, due to its low costs and health care quality”. 

Nearly 600 employees are expected at the new complex, according to CNSS Director General Ingrid Awade. These will include specialists from the Togolese armed forces. 

As a reminder, the hospital will be specialized in the fields of Medicine, Surgery, and Obstetrics (MCO). 

Octave A. Bruce  

The Togolese Minister of Economy and Finance, Sani Yaya, recently urged local economic actors to put local production first. The official did so on June 15, at the 2nd annual State-Private sector Consultation Framework meeting in Lomé.

Referring to the negative impacts of the Ukrainian war on African countries, such as the spike in prices of basic commodities, Yaya said:  "We must learn from these various crises and firmly change the paradigm to produce what we consume and consume what we produce.”

He stressed that the ongoing global crises (the pandemic, the war in Ukraine, etc.) and their consequences, should serve as a wake-up call for all actors regarding the importance of protecting macroeconomic equilibrium, and the social resilience of vulnerable communities. 

The minister’s words echo that of the Prime Minister who, during the first annual State-Private sector Consultation Framework meeting in March, urged economic operators to  "produce and transform local products," not only for the benefit of the population but also to conquer the African market in the context of the African Free Trade Area (AFTAA).

Started since last February 24th, the Russian invasion in Ukraine caused global energy and food prices to explode. In addition to oil reaching levels not seen since 2014, global prices for grain products, milk and edible oils also peaked at record levels, according to experts.

Esaïe Edoh 

Togolese travelers no longer need to present a vaccination pass or a negative Covid-19 test before crossing the border into neighboring Benin. This follows a relaxation of control measures announced by Cotonou yesterday, Wednesday, June 15, 2022, at the end of a Council of Ministers. 

"As of Thursday, June 16, 2022, at midnight, entry into Benin, both through the land, air, and sea borders, is exempt of any document related to the Covid-19," said the Beninese government. It explained that it is "due to the current evolution of the pandemic in the world in general and in [the] country in particular."

Indeed, for several months Africa has witnessed a sustained decline in the number of Covid-19 cases, and a recent assessment by WHO even estimates that the cases should fall by more than 90% in 2022, compared to last year.

In Togo, while authorities remain cautious, health measures are also being relaxed. The government has just authorized the resumption of public celebrations of traditional festivals and rites, a few months after the reopening of land borders.

Ayi Renaud Dossavi

The Lomé-based pan-African banking group Ecobank and Mastercard want to support African farmers via the digitalization of agricultural value chains. The two parties sealed a deal to this end this week, according to a statement issued on June 14, 2022.

The deal aims at making it easier for small farmers in sub-Saharan Africa to access Farm Pass, a Mastercard e-commerce platform for farmers.

According to the same source, the deal was signed in the presence of Paul-Harry Aithnard, UEMOA Regional Executive Director, Ecobank, Michael Froman, Vice Chairman of the Board, Mastercard, as well as Solomon Quaynor, Vice President for Private Sector, Infrastructure, and Industrialization at the African Development Bank Group, which supports the initiative. 

“In the framework of this partnership, Ecobank will extend the coverage and impact of Mastercard’s Farm Pass platform by leveraging its pan-African network spread across 33 countries,” the new partners said. 

Farm pass is a payment solution that helps small farmers sell their products more easily and at a fairer price. 

"Farm Pass brings together diverse agribusiness stakeholders from both the supply and demand sides of the industry on a single platform, strengthening the positive and collective impact on farming communities," the release said. "Smallholder farmers can sell their products at a better price, access quality inputs and agricultural information, get paid, buy digitally, and develop a financial profile that can enable financing opportunities for working capital and inputs," it adds.

"The issue of food security is critical and urgent at this time. We must therefore rise to this challenge by creating opportunities for growth along the agricultural value chain in Africa. Our partnership with Mastercard is timely in accelerating access to urgently needed financial services for smallholder farmers to realize Africa's full agricultural potential. It will also bring value to the entire agricultural value chain to make agriculture in Africa more profitable, competitive, and resilient, thereby contributing to the continent's economic growth," said Ade Ayeyemi, Ecobank Group CEO.

Launched in 2015, Farm Pass claims to have impacted nearly one million small farmers in Uganda, Tanzania, Kenya, and India, helping them boost their productivity and sell their products at a higher price – 25% to 50% more. 

Orabank is preparing to roll out new features on its multi-service digital banking platform ‘Keaz’ which it launched three years ago. 

The new functionalities, currently being tested internally, should, according to the lender, include, among others, transfers to prepaid cards, the delegation of authority, scheduling of payments, generation of "payment tokens", and the possibility for economic actors to perform new types of transactions through the platform dedicated to businesses (Keaz Pro, editor's note).

Also in the pipeline is a feature that allows agencies to be relocated by transferring skills to sub-agents. "All these features will be operational in the second half of 2022," said the CEO of the Togolese subsidiary, Guy Martial Awona (photo), at a meeting to popularize the application backed by the platform.

After recording a positive performance in the fiscal year 2021 (nearly 800 billion CFA francs of total assets, +36 billion compared to the previous year), Orabank has again been named the best bank in Togo by Global Finance magazine, in an increasingly competitive context.

Octave Bruce

The West Africa Food System Resilience Program (FSRP) was officially launched on June 15, 2022. This program, which was announced last November, is supported by the World Bank in Togo and six other countries in West and Central Africa (Burkina Faso, Ghana, Mali, Niger, Sierra Leone, and Chad).

It is a multisectoral initiative with a budget of $716 million whose goal is to “reduce the number of food-insecure people and strengthen the resilience of food systems,” the World Bank wrote in a press release issued on June 15, 2022.

In the long run, the program should directly benefit four million people, and it could be extended to the entire sub-region if the results satisfy the promoting institution.

Under the leadership of three subregional institutions, namely the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the Permanent Inter-State Committee for Drought Control in the Sahel (CILSS), and the West and Central African Council for Agricultural Research and Development (CORAF), the RFSR will improve agricultural productivity through investments in climate-smart agriculture and the regional agricultural research system.

In its first phase, whose implementation has just begun, the program will fund interventions in Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, and Togo, as well as actions implemented by ECOWAS, CILSS, and CORAF. In the second (which should be approved by the World Bank in July 2022), actions in Ghana, Sierra Leone, and Chad will be financed.

In addition to the World Bank, the FSRP is supported by external partners such as the Global Agriculture and Food Security Program (GAFSP), the Kingdom of the Netherlands, and the Global Risk Financing Facility (GRIF).

Ayi Renaud Dossavi