Togo First
MSC boss says Bolloré’s terminal at the port of Lomé will remain operationally independent
"The terminal managed by BAL [Bolloré Africa Logistics, editor’s note] will remain operationally independent, with its top management in Lomé, placed under the responsibility of its CEO in Puteaux [Bolloré headquarters, editor’s note], as is currently the case. The two entities will not face but complement each other." The statement was recently disclosed by Diego Aponte, President of MSC since 2014, in an interview.
Bolloré’s Togolese subsidiary is under the spotlight since it was taken over by MSC, following a deal inked last March. It draws attention also because MSC, the world’s leading shipping company, already operates in Lomé through Lomé Container Terminal (LCT), the second terminal of the Port of Lomé.
The issue lies in the fact that several port actors and observers are not fond of granting LCT full monopoly over the handling activities of the port of Lomé; this, despite the company being quite successful and having increased the port’s container traffic fivefold since its arrival. This is a situation that MSC is trying to ease before facing African regulators, who have yet to approve its deal with Bolloré.
“Our goal is not to have a dominant position that could penalize one player or another. There is a port authority whose role is precisely to regulate and ensure that everyone can operate normally in its basins,” Diego Aponte said in an attempt to reassure those concerned about the agreement. “We have therefore planned, both at BAL and MSC, to visit these various authorities in the coming months, to obtain their approval, but also to present ourselves and explain our vision,” he added.
MSC, which considers Lomé as a regional hub, claims it wants to use Togo Terminal’s facilities, alongside LCT’s, to accommodate other shipowners who serve the Togolese capital. The group operates in Togo via its container terminal investment company, Terminal Investment Limited (TIL).
“With transshipment, the volumes handled at the Lomé Container Terminal (LCT) prevent us from serving other shipowners besides MSC. So they resort to BAL’s facilities, and there is no reason for this to change,” said the son of Gianluigi Aponte, founder of MSC.
“We will not influence commercial policies and tariffs, nor the terminal’s management, to ensure that there is a real differentiation between the two port operators,” he insists.
Just like with all its new subsidiaries, “we want to keep managing … by keeping BAL as an independent company of the group,” Aponte stressed. However, in the short term, there will be new branding and a new logo.
“We do not intend to integrate BAL into MSC, but rather to find synergies with our subsidiaries to avoid duplication and overinvestment in certain facilities… We will keep the workforce and management as it is, the latter being accountable only to a new shareholder in the person of Aponte and not Bolloré.”
The explanations are given around two weeks after the Togolese minister of maritime economy told Tribune Afrique that the Togolese government “reserves the right to comment on this deal at the appropriate time”. The official also said talks regarding the MSC-Bolloré were not over, though the groups have reached an agreement.
The Togolese government is working on a new criminal procedure code
Togo wants to modernize its judicial system by adopting a new code of criminal procedure. A draft bill was adopted to this end on May 30, 2022, during the government’s latest Council of Ministers.
The bill, which contains 1047 articles, aims, according to the government, to modernize the Togolese criminal procedure and tackle “new” challenges like terrorism or maritime piracy. It will also speed up criminal procedures, and enable Togo to meet major international standards regarding individual freedom and protection of the dignity of individuals.
“As part of the vast program to modernize the judiciary, elaborating the new code of criminal procedure is one of the responses to the many challenges of the judicial world and it contributes to improving the efficiency of the judicial system in line with the goals of the first axis of the government’s 2020–2025 roadmap,” reads the Council’s statement.
In detail, the report further notes that the new code aims to bolster the rights of victims, of the defense, organize alternatives to prosecution and pre-trial detention, and establish remedies in criminal matters.
According to Akodah Ayewouadan, Minister in charge of communication and government spokesman, this planned reform will allow the effective introduction of alternatives to imprisonment in criminal affairs—such as community service or the electronic bracelet.
“The innovations are numerous, including the possibility for judges to propose alternatives, not only to prosecution but also to detention. Specifically, instead of detaining someone temporarily or permanently, we can consider solutions such as the electronic bracelet, which allows a person not to be locked up, but still be available for justice,” said the government spokesman.
Ayi Renaud Dossavi
Togo: the National Directorate of Public Procurement Management to soon undergo major reforms
Togo’s National Directorate of Public Procurement Management (DNCCP) is about to undergo restructuring. A draft decree, aimed at bolstering and extending the authority of this department to public-private partnerships (PPPs) procedures, was examined and adopted by the government during the Council of Ministers held last Monday, May 30, 2022.
“This decree, which is part of the recent reforms of the framework of public procurement, aims to adapt the DNCCP to its new missions of control of procedures related to public procurement and public-private partnership contracts,” reads the Council statement. “This reform will allow the DNCCP to process these documents more efficiently and rapidly,” the report adds.
The announcement comes shortly after another reform project aimed at turning the Public Procurement Regulatory Authority into the Public Procurement Regulatory Authority (ARCOP), thus extending its authority as well.
The DNCCP is an administrative structure under the Togolese Ministry of Economy and Finance. It is responsible for the a priori control of public procurement procedures and public service delegations.
Ayi Renaud Dossavi
Meet Yassir, the Algerian transport and delivery startup that wants to rival Gozem
Yassir, a transport and delivery startup that allows its clients to book drivers via a mobile app, will soon spread its net to Benin, Togo, and Côte d’Ivoire. The Algiers-based company which is already present in France, Canada, and the Maghreb (Algeria, Tunisia, Morocco) and recently came to Senegal, will in the new markets compete against Gozem and the Russian Yango.
“It’s imminent, we should have launched operations by the end of June,” Noureddine Tayebi, Yassir’s CEO, told Jeune Afrique.
Yassir was founded in 2016 by Amel Delli, El Mahdi Yettou, Mustapha Baha, and Noureddine Tayebi. To date, it claims over 2 million users, and 40,000 partners, and covers 26 cities in the countries where it operates. Since its launch, the company raised $67.6 million from around 30 venture capitalists and renowned business angels who have proven themselves at Uber, Spotify, Revolut, and Gojek. The name Yassir is an Algerian Arabic wordplay between “easy” and “driving.”
Whether in Lomé, Cotonou, or Abidjan, Yassir wants to deploy its flagship services, transportation, and fast delivery.
Noureddine Tayebi, the Algerian boss of Yassir, lives in Silicon Valley. For the company’s next funding round, Tayebi eyes more than double the amount raised in its first round in October 2021. Last year, the startup raised, through two Series A rounds, $37 million (October) and $30 million (November), according to data from Crunchbase, consulted by Togo First. Investors included WndrCo, VentureSouq, Spike Venture, K50 Ventures, and the famous Y Combinator, which was among the first to back the project.
Beyond transport and delivery, Yassir also looks to conquer the financial services market.
“We are now introducing financial services to help our users pay, save and borrow digitally,” Noureddine Tayebi said.
Fiacre E. Kakpo
The chambers of commerce of Guinea and Togo are working together to boost their cooperation
Appointed on March 18, 2022, the new executive board of the Chamber of Commerce, Industry, and Handicrafts of Guinea (CCIAG) is working to strengthen its cooperation with the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Togo (CCI-Togo). Last week, a delegation from CCIAG was in Lomé for this purpose. On the occasion, Nathalie Bitho, chairman of the CCI-Togo delegation, met with the Guinean delegation.
"I think that with the same realities, if the West African chambers of commerce got together, we could largely overcome the problems we have because the most important thing is the value chain," said Eric Benjamin Collé, Vice President of the CCIAG. According to the Guinean, it is time for the South-South partnership to become a reality because, "the people of different countries have the same realities with the same languages, and markets that are supplied in the same way.”
In addition to strengthening cooperation, Guinea aims to learn from reforms and other initiatives undertaken by the CCI-Togo, especially studies on the private sector, the business environment, and the legal framework, which, according to Guinea, are likely to “consolidate the place of the Chamber in the Togolese economic microcosm.”
Over the past 18 years, the CCIAG was inactive; that is until its new board of directors was appointed by the Guinean government last March.
Esaïe Edoh
Togolese PM lays the first stone of the country’s first biomass laboratory at the University of Lomé
Two years after initial steps were taken to launch the project, Togo started building its first biomass lab (LABTOGO) last week.
On Friday 27, 2022, Togolese Prime Minister Victoire Tomegah-Dogbé laid the first stone of the lab at the University of Lomé (UL). It was during a ceremony held to celebrate the 10-year anniversary of the West African Science Service Centre on Climate Change and Adapted Land Use (WASCAL) which is backed by Germany.
Research on biomass will be conducted at the lab and it will help develop innovative technologies that foster the efficient and safe use of biomass energy and biogas in Togo.
PM Tomegah Dogbé said during the ceremony that modernizing agriculture and the 10-year reforestation program remain priorities for the Togolese government, as part of efforts to tackle climate change issues.
AfDB blames climate change for agriculture’s smaller contribution to Togo’s GDP
In the past 15 years, the share of agriculture in Togo’s GDP shrank by over 12%. The African Development Bank (AfDB) believes the drop was driven by climate change.
In its latest economic outlook for the country, the pan-African institution notes that agriculture’s share in Togo’s GDP slumped from 37.3% in 2008 to 24.7%.
Regardless, chances for the country to achieve SDG 13 (Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts) are “favorable”, according to the AfDB.
"In 2021, Togo strengthened its institutional framework by adopting the REDD+ strategy and the coastal law. In addition, the solar power plant in Blitta, with a capacity of 50 MW, should help increase national access to electricity to 60% in 2022, compared to 45% in 2018," the Abidjan-based Bank adds.
Ayi Renaud Dossavi
Togo joins Forum of Incident Response and Security Teams
Togo joined the Forum of Incident Response and Security Teams (FIRST) on May 20, 2022–a new membership the country owes to its national center for response to cybersecurity incidents (CERT.tg).
Also, the Togolese Ministry of the digital economy and digitalization said joining FIRST was made possible by the government’s efforts to make the country's cyberspace safer.
As a member of the organization, CERT.tg will benefit from common capacity-building, information-sharing programs, and technical tools that will enable it to better detect and deal with cybersecurity threats.
Commenting on the development, Cina Lawson, the minister of the digital economy and digital transformation, said it confirms “the importance the country places on cybersecurity cooperation.”
Lawson also noted that international cooperation is a key pillar in Togo's cybersecurity strategy. This explains its membership in two other cybersecurity communities namely "Africa Computer Emergency Response Team (AfricaCERT)" and the "Trusted Introducer (TF-CSIRT)".
Togo is the 15th country in Africa and the 5th in West Africa to join FIRST, an organization with 100 member states and 627 CERT teams.
Esaïe Edoh
AfDB scales down Togo’s growth forecast for 2022, attributes revision to Russia-Ukraine war
From 6.2%, the African Development Bank (AfDB) scaled down its 2022 growth forecast for the Togolese economy to 5.8%. The drop, which the AfDB attributes to the Russia-Ukraine war, Covid-19, and climate change, was disclosed during the Bank’s latest general assembly held in Accra.
"For 2022, the economic outlook seemed favorable. However, the invasion of Ukraine by Russia could slow down the recovery that Togo initiated in 2021 (6% against 1.8% in 2020), with GDP growth expected at 5.8% against an initial forecast of 6.2% in early February 2022," said the Abidjan-based pan-African institution.
It should be emphasized that the AfDB’s initial forecast slightly exceeded that of the Togolese government; the latter expected a 6.1% growth rate in 2022.
Read also: Togolese government expects 6.1% economic growth in 2022, amidst post-Covid recovery
Growth slows, inflation rises
Regarding inflation, the AfDB now expects it will reach 4.6%, up from 2.4% initially. Most significantly, it will affect imported products like wheat.
"Togo could be affected because of its trade relations with Russia and Ukraine. About 40% of Togo's wheat imports in 2020 came from Russia, suggesting a strong likelihood of a negative effect on the availability and price of the grain," the AfDB wrote in a report.
Other issues concern relations with Togo’s partners, in Europe and Asia (China, India notably) who have to overcome energy (gas) supply hurdles paired with other consequences of sanctions imposed on Russia.
"The country could also be affected by the negative effects of the conflict on partner countries, such as those in the eurozone and Asia," the report says.
Let’s not forget Covid-19 and its variants, whose economic and health impacts still impair supply chains. This is particularly the case in China, whose strict anti-covid policy affects its major ports.
A new Novissi is needed
In response to the situation, characterized by soaring prices of consumer goods and energy, the AfDB recommended measures to bolster consumption and revive Togo’s economy. The measures resemble the government’s Novissi cash-transfer scheme launched in 2020 to help people cope with the Covid-19 crisis.
"Awareness of the above risks would make it necessary to scale up stimulus measures such as the NOVISSI program to alleviate the burden of soaring prices on households already hard hit by the effects of the health crisis," the AfDB said.
Ayi Renaud Dossavi
Togo to launch annual reforestation campaign on June 1
In Togo, the second reforestation campaign will start on June 1, which coincides with the 46th edition of National Tree Day. The announcement was made on May 27, 2022, by Ministers Foli-Bazi Katari and Akodah Ayewouadan, respectively in charge of the environment and communication (and government spokesman), at a press conference.
This year, Togo aims to plant 21 million trees, against around 3 million trees planted last year, according to Katari. This is in line with the objective of planting 1 billion trees by 2030, an average of 100 million per year.
"This year, because we started early, we were able to mobilize 133,000 hectares of land, which we just need to plant 100 million trees," said the minister.
The government plans to finance reforestation initiatives, led by municipalities or private actors, to achieve its goal.
On June 1, 2022, one million seedlings are scheduled to be planted.