Togo First
Togo’s National Fund for Inclusive Finance aims to cover 255,000 new beneficiaries by 2025
By 2025, 255,000 more people will benefit from the government’s financial inclusion efforts in Togo. During the council of ministers held last Thursday, new measures relative to the access to the National Fund for Inclusive Finance (FNFI) were taken. The measures, specifically, are aimed at accelerating and ensuring the population’s inclusion as many still have no access to microfinance services.
In detail, the authorities took three major measures. The first is a reduction in management fees for financial service providers operating in areas with low access to such services. The second measure is a reduction in interest rates for beneficiaries in the same geographical areas (i.e., a reduction of 2 points on the interest rate of all products put in place by the Fund), and finally, the third is an increase in the rate of compensation for unpaid loans for providers from 5% to 15%.
Though there are still many areas that are not covered by the FNFI, official statistics put at nearly 1.8 million the number of direct loans provided by this Fund over the past seven years. This volume corresponds to more than CFA101 billion.
In line with the new measures, the council of ministers has approved the recovery, by competent authorities, of debts owed to microfinance institutions that have been excluded from the FNFI’s partnership program in 2021.
Esaïe Edoh
Togo: Each of the five regions will soon get a mother-child hospital through public-private partnerships
The Togolese government plans to build five mother-child care centers in the country, one in each health region. The project was presented to the Council of Ministers on Thursday 21 April 2022 by the Minister Delegate in charge of universal access to healthcare. It should be carried out through a Public-Private Partnership, between the National Institute of Health Insurance (INAM) and “a private partner”. There is no further detail at the moment.
“This project will make available more pediatric resuscitation equipment, especially neonatal, and will thus help provide better care to mothers and their children and avoid deaths,” the government wrote in a statement. In this framework, Lomé is exploring the possibilities “to start construction imminently”.
One of the five centers planned is a mother-child hospital which will be built in the Grand Lomé-Maritime region. The facility structure, which is expected to have 175 beds, should be one of the country’s top hospitals. In other, less populated, regions, the hospitals projected should each have a 50-bed capacity, according to the information available.
The INAM, let’s emphasize, is already involved in Togo’s plans to boost access to healthcare. Among others, the institution is the one in charge of deploying the universal health insurance project in the country.
This year, the state plans to invest CFA19 billion in universal health coverage.
Ayi Renaud Dossavi
Investment: Togo sets up a unit dedicated to public-private partnerships
To better manage the integration of private actors in its development strategy, Togo has established a public-private partnership unit, which will be attached to the Presidency. The authorities adopted a decree to this end last Thursday, during the ministers’ council.
According to the council’s statement, the new unit will “advise, and provide expertise to contractors in the preparation and execution of public-private partnership deals.” Through the move, Lomé hopes to “make the country more competitive and diversify its sources of financing for developing strategic infrastructure that will improve the living standards of populations.”
In the past few years, Togo has, through its National Development Plan notably, given more importance to private actors in its strategy to mobilize funding for its structuring projects. It even set up an investment promotion ministry to this end.
Regarding public-private partnerships, they enabled Togo to mobilize investors and resources for big projects like the Adétikopé Industrial Platform (PIA), the Kekeli Efficient Power thermal plant, and Blitta’s PV plant.
Togo: Government announces a new strategy to make local microfinance sector more performant
Last Thursday, during the council of ministers held in the Savanes region, the ministry of finance presented a “new strategy” that is aimed at making the country’s microfinance sector “more performant”, “while at the same time protecting populations.”
“The strategy will help protect people’s savings and clean up the industry,” the statement from the council reads.
Among others, it will help decentralized finance systems which are struggling, and “eradicate the proliferation of illegal companies as they harm the vulnerable population,” the statement adds.
In the West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU), Togo was the country where the share of microfinance institutions in GDP is the highest in 2020 - nearly 260 billion or 6%.
Ayi Renaud Dossavi
Togo: Emergency Program for the Savanes region will cost CFA16 billion
The Emergency Program for the Savanes Region will cost CFA16 billion. The figure was disclosed last Thursday by the government, after the council of ministers held in Cinkassé that day.
The program, which will end in 2025, covers the following sectors: water, energy, health, infrastructure, education, and agriculture. In the water sector, Lomé already announced that 75 boreholes would be dug under the program, in around 30 communities. Also, drinking water supply systems will be built in all military bases of Cinkassé.
In the energy sector, the government plans to expand the country’s power grid, connect more than 10 communities to the grid, as well as install solar light poles.
In the same region, two peripheral care units (USP) are going to be built to boost access to health care, the technical division of health centers will be reinforced, and a USP will be turned into a medical-social center (CMS).
Regarding education, more than 30 new classrooms will be built in Boadé, Gnoaga, Gouloungoussi, Nassiégou, Sam Naba, and Cinkassé.
Two planned agricultural development zones (ZAAP) should also be unearthed in Timbou and Gounlougoussi. Meanwhile, water reservoirs are already being set up in seven communities.
It should be noted that nearly 10 rural roads, spanning 150 km, are being constructed. They will help open up and connect towns like Biankouri, Zintango, Korenzoaga, Kassou, Safobé, Natingou, and Dontougou.
The Emergency Program for the Savanes region was designed by the government. It aims to help people living in this region as they are exposed to security threats. Indeed, at the beginning of November last year, terrorists were pushed back by the army in Sanloaga.
Esaïe Edoh
Togo is one of the few African countries that have deployed commercial 5G networks (GSMA)
Togo is among the five sub-Saharan African countries where commercial 5G networks are already operational. This is according to GSMA, an international organization that represents the interests of over 750 mobile operators.
The four other countries are Kenya, Madagascar, Seychelles, and South Africa. Meanwhile, Nigeria, Mali, Ethiopia, and Mauritius are moving towards deploying their first 5G networks.
Togo became the first country in West Africa, and the third in Africa, to deploy the technology in November 2020. At the time, Togocom, a subsidiary of Axian Group which also runs Telma in Madagascar, had revealed that it had deployed its commercial 5G network in the country.
In March 2021, the same operator said it deployed the network at Lomé’s airport, in the city’s administrative area, and at the Adétikopé Industrial Platform (PIA).
According to GSMA, 5G is already being widely used in key markets like China, South Korea, and the U.S. By the end of 2021, 176 operators in 70 countries had already deployed commercial 5G networks.
Fiacre E. Kakpo
West Africa: Regional decentralization experts meet in Lomé to reflect on how to better manage local communities
Lomé has been hosting since April 20 a three-day meeting aimed at improving governance in Togolese municipalities. Organized by the Network of Public Training Centers and Institutions for Decentralization Actors in West Africa (RéCIFAD) and the Federation of Togolese Municipalities (FCT), the meeting gathers more than 80 local elected officials and actors involved in the management of local finances, from seven West African countries.
Participants present will share their experiences in the management of municipal affairs and rethink decentralization in their home country. They will also analyze and appreciate the training mechanisms to be implemented for the benefit of local authorities.
Togo will, during this meeting, learn from other countries that have made progress in the decentralization process.
“Our municipalities are incipient, they are making efforts, but they need to learn, to be inspired by initiatives elsewhere,” said Lardja Douti, Secretary-General of the Ministry of Territorial Administration, Decentralization and Local Government.
This meeting, as a reminder, is organized within the framework of the implementation of the Regional Capacity Building in Decentralization and Governance project (ProDeG IV), financed and executed by the German Cooperation (GIZ). It comes at a time when Togo launched its decentralization process almost 3 years ago with the holding of local elections, a first since 1987.
Esaïe Edoh
Togo: Police officers seize an important quantity of corn being illegally sent to Benin
Togolese authorities announced on Wednesday, April 20, 2022, the seizure of 26 tons of corn from Bassar (246 km north of Lomé), bound for Benin. The goods, which were destined for export, were intercepted by the Gendarmerie Nationale at the entrance of Aného.
The owner of the goods did not have any document from the ministry in charge of trade and local consumption authorizing her to transport "such a large quantity of goods", according to the police officers. “We cannot allow this volume of goods to be exported while prices on the local market are surging significantly,” said Ouro-Koura Agadazi, director-general of the National Agency for Food Safety of Togo (ANSAT).
The goods seized will be diverted to ANSAT stores and later made available to the population.
The seizure aligns with the provision of June 2021 under which the export of cereal products for mass consumption is subject to prior authorization. The decision was taken to avoid goods shortages that spark speculation.
Esaïe Edoh
Togo remains Gabon’s top goods supplier in Africa for the second consecutive year
Just like in 2020, Togo was Gabon’s first African supplier of goods last year. It sold the Central African country CFA41.6 billion worth of goods over the period, according to Le Nouveau Gabon, a local media, quoting data from Gabon’s Directorate General of Customs and Excise (DGDI).
The figure–which includes petroleum products sales–was down 35% compared to 2020’s CFA65 billion. Globally, Togo was Gabon’s fifth-largest supplier in 2021. Togo provided 3.4% of all goods purchased by Libreville, behind France (1st with 25.4%), Belgium (11.9%), China (11%), and the U.S. (3,7%).
The goods came from the Port of Lomé whose performance has been steadily increasing in recent years, and which serves as a relay and re-export point for many products from outside the country, for the benefit of countries in the sub-region and the continent.
The Port of Lomé has two terminals for handling containers, including LCT (Lomé Container Terminal), a key transshipment platform owned by MSC (Mediterranean Shipping Company), and Togo Terminal of Bolloré Africa Logistics.
Besides Gabon, Togo was also Cameroon’s first African supplier.
In 2020, Lomé became the second-largest transshipment port in sub-Saharan Africa.
Ayi Renaud Dossavi
Togo: Tobacco smoking hurts the poor more than the rich (Study)
In Togo, around 10.6% of men, aged between 15 and 49, smoke, against about 0.9% of women in the same age range. The data, published in 2018 by the National Institute for Statistics, Economic and Demographic Studie (INSEED), was recently taken up in a study that the CADERDT conducted to assess the economic impacts of smoking on Togolese households. The results of this study were published on April 19, 2022.
“In addition to health consequences including cancers, airway obstruction, reduced lung function, heart disease, and stroke, tobacco consumption is not without consequences for household welfare,” the CADERDT notes.
Relative to finances, people spend on tobacco “at the expense of basic needs such as food, education, health, housing,” as smoking, due to its “addictive nature” tends to change the spending habits of smokers.
Rural and poor people are most affected
According to the study, tobacco use significantly affects poor and rural populations more than middle-income and richer populations.
Indeed, because of the low proportion of smokers, tobacco use has little economic impact on total household expenditures, and "tobacco expenditures only affect low-income, middle-income, and rural households," the report says.
"In low-income households, an increase in their tobacco expenditure of CFA1,000 causes a decrease in the share of housing, cooking energy, education, alcohol, entertainment, and gambling in their budget, with an amplitude ranging from 0.00002 for entertainment to 0.008 for housing; and an increase in the share of food in their budget, by 0.006,” according to the retrospective study, based on data from the latest Harmonized Survey on Living Conditions of Households (EHCVM 2018-2019).
Note that in Togo, the essential part of household resources is devoted to food; 50% of households spend at least 43.68% of their annual budget on food, which represents an amount of about 573,198 FCFA, according to available data. These expenses are followed by unspecified expenses (36.35%), and housing expenses (at least 4.99% of the median household's annual budget).
In this context, CADERDT recommends efforts to reduce the purchase and consumption of tobacco and its by-products in Togo, particularly targeting low and middle-income households in rural areas. It also suggests the implementation of a mixed system of taxation of tobacco and its by-products as well as bolstering efforts to tackle the illicit trade of tobacco products by better monitoring their mandatory secure marking.
Ayi Renaud Dossavi