TRADE is the very life of the economy. It is in trade that one accesses the value that the other party provides. It is trade that allows wealth creation to take place. It is trade that distributes wealth among the nations and continents of the world. In the records of trade, leaders can see where economic threats and business opportunities lie.  It is the job of economic managers (and brand managers) to monitor trade and prescribe measures that will correct unfavourable situations. Sadly, Africa’s trade situation betrays an alarming neglect by those who ought to have watched over it.

The continent’s share of world trade is an insignificant five percent. Hardly has the black man’s continent got something to offer other than raw materials and that makes the people the poorest in the world. Cocoa, rubber, shea butter , petroleum, iron ore and other commodities go cheap from Africa and once the other continent has processed them into secondary or tertiary products like beverages, pharmaceuticals, shoes and machines, Africans buy them at a huge cost since (let’s say, the European) personnel who added the value have to be handsomely paid; likewise, other European inputs such as land, capital and shipping have to be profit-centres too.

Africa’s manufacturing sector is still emerging. Only South Africa is an industrialized nation.  Almost totally dependent on other continents for their supplies of manufactured products, African nations have little trading between them; their trade interest is mostly the industrialised countries of Asia, Europe and America that need raw materials to feed their production. A single African country commands 75 per cent of inter-African trade leaving the rest of the 54 nations in the continent to share 25 per cent…industrialised South Africa.

But it is so discernible that standardisation is a major force determining each continent’s trade-power. Nevertheless, this force works for the continent’s economy only when the countries have standards in common; when the countries collectively uphold the standards. Where only lip service is paid to the prescribed harmonisation of standards, not so much can be achieved.

The importance of standardisation to Africa’s fortunes was not lost on the founding fathers of the African Organisation for Standardisation (ARSO). An inter-governmental body, ARSO was founded by the Organisation for African Unity (OAU) {which is now known as the African Union (AU)} and the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) in 1977.

With its secretariat in Nairobi, Kenya, the organisation has its roots in the African independence heroes’ desire for inter-African trade as key to the continent’s prosperity and their understanding that standardisation is the strategy for achieving it. Accordingly, the organisation is mandated to harmonise national and sub-regional standards as African standards. It is also mandated to promote and facilitate exchange of experts, information and cooperation in training of personnel in standardisation activities.  Another objective of ARSO is to coordinate the views of its members at the ISO, IEC, OIML, Codex and other organisations that engage in standardisation activities.

Despite this inspiring mandate, ARSO has so far not succeeded in rallying the whole of the continent to one regime of standardisation. The organisation has a lot to achieve in the area of harmonisation of standards which is the key to the desired fortune. It is short of achievements in this area due to the non-commitment of many African countries (even those that have ratified the ARSO constitution) to the success of the body.

Many of them do not pay their dues and do not participate in ARSO’s activities. Worse still, many of them do not even have a national standards body; their standardisation activities are carried out by an ordinary directorate within a ministry.

It is against this background that the organisation’s current president and the director general of the Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON), Dr. Joseph Ikem Odumodu is hosting the ARSO President’s Forum – a special convocation bringing the heads of standards authorities from all over Africa together in Abuja on June 22-24, 2015 to brainstorm on how to engineer free flow of goods, services and technology across the continent and improve the people’s lives.  Put simply, the ARSO President’s Forum is aimed at activating the collective efforts in standardisation that will break the barriers to trade for the continent to prosper.

Analysts are convinced that the Forum can really yield the expected fruits. For example, Jack Jose, a  writer on branding and standardisation,  says that  “once all the bosses in charge of standardisation meet and get immersed in the good news and excitement of standardisation as a proven strategy for both the individual countries and the continent, their interest in and commitment to ARSO will increase and that will make the body stronger.

Then those of them that have no national standards body will, under the influence of those that already have, begin to strive to have theirs. Those who are not building up their national quality infrastructure will also learn from those who are.  As the quality infrastructure improves across the continent, better African products will emerge, winning more buyers from within Africa and even beyond, and making increased inter-African trade and increased African share of world trade a big reality.”

On what Nigeria especially has to gain from this Forum, Jack Jose has this to say: “As a country pursuing economic diversification, Nigeria will need a larger market for its increasing products – and what continent is better placed to receive Nigeria’s products than its own continent! Of course, it’s like a sacrifice for Nigeria to host this big conference, but being the continent’s largest economy, it’s potentially the biggest beneficiary”.

Indeed, upon his election as ARSO president in Yaounde, Cameroun two years ago, Dr. Odumodu urged a stronger ARSO and massive investment in quality infrastructure on both national and continental levels. He promised that if all heads of government and heads of standards authorities in Africa heeded the call, the quality of goods and services from the continent would improve and attract more buyers (more income for investors and workers) and more employment for the youth and help the continent transit to an industrialised economy whose products would be globally acceptable! Dr. Odumodu also instituted the African Standards Day to help draw the continent’s attention to the benefits of international standards.

The ARSO President’s Forum has three sub-events namely the ARSO CEOs Roundtable, the ARSO Made in Africa Expo and the African Standards Day Seminar. The CEOs Roundtable is an exclusive conference for only the 54 heads of standards authorities in Africa since they have to iron out their differences and move the continent forward in standardisation and internal trade.

The Made in Africa Expo is a trade fair where exhibitors from all over Africa and seekers of standard products will meet, learn, make enquiries or transact business as they wish. A wide range of products will be on the stands and they will be good products befitting of a gathering of Africa’s standardisation experts, industrialists, marketers and seekers of high quality products. The only companies who can expose their products in this fair are the ones that present evidence of current approval from their country’s national standards body. For example, Unilever can obtain a stand in this fair only through SON.

The African Standards Day Seminar boasts an eminent resource person – Nigeria’s minister of agriculture. The minister will be speaking on The Role of Standards in Promoting Sustainable Agriculture and Food Security in Africa. The discussants will be selected from among the heads of standards authorities to provide additional country perspectives.

According to Dr Paul Angya, a director at SON and chairman of the local organizing committee, “invitations to the Forum have already gone to the standards authority in each African country as well as to key industrialists and business people. The members of the mass media continent-wide are also being invited.”

The signs are all there that Africa’s trade situation will never be the same again after the ARSO President’s Forum takes place. The Forum will be a turning point in the continent’s joint effort to make progress.

CMr. Chimeziri Franklin, a business historian, wrote from Lagos.