March 10, 2004

By Ronnie Morris

Cape Town - The cup of coffee that Whitey Basson, the chief executive of Shoprite/Checkers, had with Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni yesterday led to the launch of Rwenzori, a range of premium ground coffee, on to the shelves of the supermarket.

The launch was attended by Alec Erwin, the minister of trade and industry, his Ugandan counterpart Edward Rugumayo and Andrew Rugasira, the chairman and managing director of the Rwenzori Coffee Company.

Basson said what made the coffee applaudable was that it was produced by an African country, and distributed by Shoprite, a true African company trading in 15 countries on the continent.

Over a cup of coffee with Museveni they discussed the problems associated with the 28 days it took for a container to travel from Mombasa to Kampala, and the fact that while Uganda was one of the world's best coffee producers, Shoprite had to buy through European coffee giants with little benefit to either the producers or the buyer.

Uganda produced 12 percent of the world's coffee and it received 0.7 percent of the revenue. It was more economically viable for Shoprite to buy coffee that would sell locally for under R20.

Uganda, however, could not perform in isolation and far too many countries were not assisting in the African continent's turnaround. 

Too much red tape needed to be addressed. It could, for example, take 40 days and five different inspection agencies to deliver a consignment to some country; when Shoprite flies in its plane the passengers need visas and cannot clear customs in a hangar; and to reclaim customs duties on re-export, Shoprite needs approximately 35 tons of photocopies to finalise 2 800 claims.

The company also needs computers worth R200 million to control all the different duties and taxes on 250 000 lines in 15 countries.

Erwin said the launch of Mwenzori coffee marked a new beginning in economic relations between the two countries and in the continent at large as the initiative was likely to set a new tone for trade relations.

African countries could, and should, start trading among one another.

Erwin said that while Africa had sophisticated recognition agreements with Europe, such agreements existed with anyone in Africa.

The result was that it takes a bus eight hours to clear customs.

South Africa, as a trading partner with the rest of Africa, must increase two-way trade and take steps to buy more goods from Uganda, especially the country's processed goods, Erwin said.