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Comment
Friday,
April 8, 2005
Mungatana and the fruit factory
request
By WYCLIFFE
MUGA /Coast Forum
In case
you missed it, here is an illuminating story from The
EastAfrican. The out-going director-general of the
International Centre for Insect Physiology and Ecology
(ICIPE) in Nairobi once read in a local paper that Garsen
MP Danson Mungatana had requested the government to
put up a fruit-processing factory in his constituency.
This is because mangoes were perennially rotting there
for lack of buyers.
Dr Hans
Herren responded to this by writing to Mr Mungatana
and requesting for an appointment. He had a proposal
for the assistant minister, based on the products of
a certain Swiss manufacturing company which produced
"container industries". Such industries are designed
to be set up in places which have no infrastructure.
To Dr Herren’s
considerable surprise, when he at last met Mr Mungatana,
the MP could not recall ever speaking about the subject.
He had no real interest in the possibilities that such
"container industries" had to offer. Indeed Dr Herren
left with the impression that the MP had never meant
a word he spoke when he had made that plea for a processing
plant on behalf of his constituents.
There is
a lesson in this anecdote that the departing ICIPE boss
provided. It is that these weekend political rallies
that our politicians are so fond of, are really just
a waste of time.
They forget
their own words, as soon as they have spoken them.
Anyone who
has seen the sheer scale of waste in the mango plantations
in Tana River District, cannot fail to sympathise with
those who live there. Yet now we learn that the MP for
Garsen threw away an opportunity to set up a fruit processing
plant there.
Port lessons from the
Netherlands
When one
of the many parliamentary committees recently visited
Mombasa, its chairman, Siakago MP Justin Muturi, stated
that as the port was already making money, there was
no need to privatise it, as such privatisation would
lead to loss of jobs. This remark touches on a matter
which has not been satisfactorily resolved all these
years: What really is the purpose of a port like the
one at Mombasa?
Is the port
primarily a source of jobs for people of this region?
Or is it supposed to make profits for the Treasury?
Or could it be that the port is primarily supposed to
act as a catalyst for greater trade for countries within
the region, which depend on it for shipping out exports,
and shipping in imports?
Thinking
about this, I remembered a conversation I once had with
a man from the Netherlands who was visiting Mombasa.
I asked about the sources of wealth in his country,
as the Netherlands is really a small place.
He told
me that their two great ports played a big role in their
economy: "You must have heard about how busy Amsterdam
and Rotterdam are - among the busiest ports in the world.
Do you think all those goods passing inwards through
these ports are intended for our own internal market?
Or that the many tons of exports are our own products?
The Netherlands is a small country, and our needs are
small. It’s the fact that many German exporters find
it cheaper to use our ports that make them so busy.
Amsterdam and Rotterdam are actually more efficient
and cheaper to use than most German ports."
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