Logistics in Africa
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Logistics in Africa
Network effects
Oct 16th 2008 | MOMBASA
From The Economist print edition
Connectivity and commitment pay dividends in African transport
ASIDE from a few niche industries such as cut flowers, which are air-freighted from Kenya and Ethiopia to auctions in the Netherlands, African trade has not changed much since the end of the colonial era. Unprocessed raw materials go out; finished goods come in. The trade imbalance is vividly illustrated by the ships sent from Asia to pick up empty containers left at African ports. Within Africa, moreover, it is difficult and costly to move goods. The continent has only a few broken-down railways. It has nothing resembling a transcontinental motorway. Even the British colonial dream of a road connecting Cape Town with Cairo failed.
Today, getting a container to the heart of Africa—from Douala in Cameroon to Bangassou in the Central African Republic, say—still means a wait of up to three weeks at the port on arrival; roadblocks, bribes, pot-holes and mud-drifts on the road along the way; malarial fevers, prostitutes and monkey-meat stews in the lorry cabin; hyenas and soldiers on the road at night. The costs of fuel and repairs make even the few arterial routes (beyond southern Africa) uneconomic. A study by America’s trade department found that it cost more to ship a ton of wheat from Mombasa in Kenya to Kampala in Uganda than it did to ship it from Chicago to Mombasa.
But several companies are trying to make the best of Africa’s creaking infrastructure to construct transcontinental logistics networks. Among them are DHL, Maersk, Dubai World and Chinese companies supplying oil and mining projects in Angola and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The clear leader so far is Bolloré Africa Logistics, a division of Bolloré, a French industrial conglomerate.
Bolloré’s African adventure started in the 1980s when Vincent Bolloré, the omnivorous billionaire who heads the family firm, began to buy up...
Network effects
Oct 16th 2008 | MOMBASA
From The Economist print edition
Connectivity and commitment pay dividends in African transport
ASIDE from a few niche industries such as cut flowers, which are air-freighted from Kenya and Ethiopia to auctions in the Netherlands, African trade has not changed much since the end of the colonial era. Unprocessed raw materials go out; finished goods come in. The trade imbalance is vividly illustrated by the ships sent from Asia to pick up empty containers left at African ports. Within Africa, moreover, it is difficult and costly to move goods. The continent has only a few broken-down railways. It has nothing resembling a transcontinental motorway. Even the British colonial dream of a road connecting Cape Town with Cairo failed.
Today, getting a container to the heart of Africa—from Douala in Cameroon to Bangassou in the Central African Republic, say—still means a wait of up to three weeks at the port on arrival; roadblocks, bribes, pot-holes and mud-drifts on the road along the way; malarial fevers, prostitutes and monkey-meat stews in the lorry cabin; hyenas and soldiers on the road at night. The costs of fuel and repairs make even the few arterial routes (beyond southern Africa) uneconomic. A study by America’s trade department found that it cost more to ship a ton of wheat from Mombasa in Kenya to Kampala in Uganda than it did to ship it from Chicago to Mombasa.
But several companies are trying to make the best of Africa’s creaking infrastructure to construct transcontinental logistics networks. Among them are DHL, Maersk, Dubai World and Chinese companies supplying oil and mining projects in Angola and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The clear leader so far is Bolloré Africa Logistics, a division of Bolloré, a French industrial conglomerate.
Bolloré’s African adventure started in the 1980s when Vincent Bolloré, the omnivorous billionaire who heads the family firm, began to buy up...