Big Brother returns.....

It's back. Bigger and brasher than ever. Big Brother Africa returned to M-Net tonight with 14 new hopefuls in the running for the $200,000 prize and the promise of celebrity status. It is strangely compelling entertainment, though its launch yesterday was rather spoilt by the device of filling the house entirely with men - of whom presumably half will be evicted within the first week to make way for women.

When George Orwell, in his classic novel 1984, developed the Big Brother concept: a world in which all communication media is subordinate to the government's interpretation of reality, and where television is the principal means of thought control, could he have imagined that people would compete, voluntarily, to surrender their privacy, dignity and liberty for the pursuit of, let's be honest, a substantial (but probably not life-changing) sum of money. I doubt it very much: my guess is that he would have been deeply saddened - if not surprised - by the triumph of greed over basic human values.

In defence of shows like Big Brother, it is sometimes argued that it's fine - the participants have voluntarily surrendered themselves and that they can exercise their right to leave the house at any time - but is this really the case? These young contestants are products of a new consumer culture, where traditional values are meaningless, image is everything, and the ideals of consumerism and fame walk down the aisle together in a marriage of convenience. Any normal sense of good judgment is quickly lost in the cauldron of the house. Big Brother can ask the contestants to do anything and they comply. In so doing, they push themselves beyond the healthy limits of normal behaviour....

Entertainment? Of a sort, undoubtedly. but a deeply unpleasant, manipulative and voyeuristic sort.

The Last Africans

This painting hangs on my sitting room wall. The image does not do it justice. It is beautiful: an untitled impressionistic oil painting of a nomadic group of people in Northern Kenya. I bought it about 14 years ago at a small exhibition in Nairobi entitled "The Last Africans".

My main memory of the Last Africans exhibition is a brief and impromptu introductory speech delivered by my friend and and former colleague, Matthias Schmale. Matthias was a compelling speaker, not least due to his sincerity, and he took this occasion to speak eloquently about his sadness that the era of the pastoralist and nomadic life practiced across most of the African continent was coming to an end: that the traditions and modus vivendi of the Turkana, the Karamajong, the Rendille, the Samburu and, most iconic of all African pastoralists, the Maasai, were dwindling into scattered tourist exhibits amid the farms, settlements and towns created through population growth, the march of technology and urban development. His lament was not romantic: it was for the impoverishment to us all brought about by the reduction of cultural diversity.

My reading matter over the past week has been a collection of papers selected by Nigel Halford of the Rothamsted Institute in UK, entitled Plant Biotechnology. For a non-scientist, much of this book has been extremely difficult to understand, but I was keen to try to improve my understanding of transgenics/genetic modification and its impact. Included in the anthology is a short paper published by researchers from the University of Cape Town on the potential for inserting a "water-efficiency" gene into maize, the staple crop for most of East and Southern Africa. The authors are in no doubt that this would be a positive move, as it would allow the cultivation of maize to spread into areas hitherto too dry for farming.

In this connection, recent press publications in Kenya have reported that considerable applied research in WEMA (Water Efficient Maize for Africa) is underway - with the potential to open up new low rainfall areas in Kenya for the cultivation of maize. Kenya needs it: the Prime Minister, Raila Odinga, recently forecast a shortfall of about 1 million tonnes (30% of Kenya's annual consumption requirements) due to patchy rainfall. This is nothing new: 8 years out of 10 Kenya struggles to grow enough maize for its burgeoning population - mainly due to reliance on rainfall for water requirements, depleted soils, and the widespread use of poor quality planting material.

Advances in agricultural technology over the last 100 years have supported massive population growth. Through effective selection and breeding programmes, plant breeders have produced ever more productive crop varieties. The Haber-Bosch process for utilising atmospheric nitrogen has provided the necessary source of nutrition for these varieties. And now, transgenic technologies offer the potential to accelerate conventional plant breeding through the production of uber-crops capable of resistance to herbicides, drought, soil salinity and who knows what sort of adverse conditions. But these advances carry a cost. One wonders what the consequences of WEMA's introduction will be for Kenya's pastoralists and biodiversity as the area under cultivation of maize expands.

Clinging on in ever more marginal areas, the pastoralist way of life appears to be an inevitable casualty of the modern world. As Einstein, in his wonderful 1949 essay entitled "Why Socialism" observed "The time—which, looking back, seems so idyllic—is gone forever when individuals or relatively small groups could be completely self-sufficient."

Loan Shark

Borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry, and the loan oft loses both itself and its friend. So spake the wise Polonius to his son, Laertes, in a pre-capitalist era. But now, Shakespeare’s sage advice seems hopelessly outdated. Debt is now so deeply entrenched in our society that it is almost impossible to imagine a world without it.

I am currently attending the Global Philanthropy Forum in Washington, a gathering of remarkable people drawn together from around the world with one main objective: to find ways of improving the human condition. Much discussion has centred around the success of the microfinance movement in developing countries: the positive impact of providing poor people with small (and hitherto unavailable) amounts of credit which enable them to improve their lives. Microfinance advocates use heart-warming anecdotes to illustrate its success in lifting individuals out of poverty. It makes a great story.

In this morning’s newspaper, my eye was taken by a headline concerning a Presidential probe into US credit card interest rates. President Obama is making good his campaign promise to investigate the high cost of consumer debt at a time when, we are told, it is ever more important to raise consumer spending and unfreeze the market for credit. Apparently, many credit providers have recently hiked the cost of debt, in some cases to 30% per annum. Make no mistake, with inter-bank lending and depositor saving rates close to zero, this looks like exceptionally good business for financial institutions, laced with more than a dash of market failure. Bring on the regulator!

And yet interest rates at or above 30% are the norm in the world of microfinance, the latest “donor darling”, which seems to suggest that this cost of money – so unacceptable to policy-makers in the USA – is somehow entirely acceptable across the developing world. The fact is, that unless inflation is high, it is almost impossible to use expensive finance like this for anything other than short term trade finance or urgent consumption requirements, like health care or school fees. While this is unquestionably useful, in that it does provide access to short term money, it is harder to identify any systemic impact on poverty – if anything, interest rates like this will impoverish rather than enrich borrowers.

In defence, Microfinanciers say that these interest rates are fine: people are willing to pay even higher rates. They quote a willingness to pay rates of 50%+, but they seem to have missed the simple point that poor people in desperate need of cash have always borrowed unwisely: loan sharks and tallymen have always found a ready market in poverty.

Certainly, in East Africa, my own experience suggests that microfinance seldom, if ever, leads to increased employment. The small size of loans, allied to extremely high interest rates, usually means that microfinance is restricted to sole traders. With the best will in the world, a thriving economy cannot be built on sole traders alone. If we are going to have a real and long term impact on poverty, we need businesses that can generate employment for others, which means more small and medium-sized enterprises. In an environment like East Africa, where, as a result of rapid population growth more than 2 million people will be entering the labour market every year for the forseeable future, the need to create jobs is essential.

Standing on Your Own Two Feet

Development aid to Africa is once again beleaguered by assailants. It's nothing new: Graham Hancock started it about 20 years ago with the still-popular Lords of Poverty. But the number of recent attacks is rising rapidly. It has become fashionable to bad-mouth the alphabet soup of the development world. There are a host of recently-published accounts, including Dambisa Moyo's Dead Aid and William Easterly's White Man's Burden, which make broadly the same point: development aid has failed.

Of course, the aid industry retains its apologists, most of whom owe their livelihoods to it. They say things like “almost any result can be obtained when aid is lumped together”, or “We’ve learned from the successes and failures of the past: our new programmes have clearly defined outcomes…..” Well, maybe, but as Mark Twain observed: history doesn't repeat itself, but it does rhyme, so please excuse my skepticism.

The simple fact is that if you speak to anyone who has been involved in development assistance in Africa for any significant length of time they will reluctantly admit that it has been neither effective nor efficient. Several hundreds of billions of Dollars have been spent without achieving several hundreds of billions' worth of value. True, there are beacons of success, but they are few and far between and generally owe their success to the actions and determination of remarkable individuals

My principal objection to the aid business relates to the dependency culture it creates. This culture manifests itself in all sorts of ways, but something much ignored by aid advocates is its impact on the labour market. In my experience, with the possible exception of the banking and legal sectors, aid organizations in Africa tend to be the highest payers, offering the best terms and conditions of employment. My argument is that this discourages the brightest and most dynamic individuals from going into private enterprise and therefore deprives the private sector of the kind of talent it needs in order to grow. And, if we are being honest, it is hard to deny that the private sector is the engine of economic development and wealth creation. It's hardly a new idea: Schumpeter, in his Theory of Economic Development, published just under 100 years ago, postulated the thesis that development is propelled, not by Government intervention, but by the actions of entrepreneurs. If writing today, it is hard to imagine that Schumpeter would have been a supporter of international aid. It is far more likely that he would have subscribed to Dambisa Moyo's conclusion that the growth of the private sector (albeit with effective regulation) and free enterprise represents the best prospect for sustainable development.

In saying this, I recognise that to dismantle international development aid overnight (as Ms Moyo seems to suggest) would have disastrous short term consequences in health, education and many other social goods, but there has to be a policy of withdrawal and transition if we are going to find a way of breaking the current dependency culture.

And now to explain the picture. It's a snap of my daughter Roxanne taken about four weeks ago, just before she took her first few faltering steps. Just as for my two older sons, I have witnessed the immense effort, the colossal motivation and the tireless determination that children have to stand on their own two feet: unsupported by their parents. And it is universally true – it doesn’t matter what culture, what race, what socio-economic background. Human beings everywhere want to stand on their own two feet.

In the words of Abraham Lincoln, "You cannot permanently do more for people than they are capable of doing for themselves". It's time for Western Governments to admit failure, abandon aid in its present form and support private sector development by (among other things) the removal of unfair trade barriers and investment in improved infrastructure. Africa is perfectly able to stand on its own two feet. Let it do so.

The Africa Seed Investment Fund

It has been a while since my previous post. Apart from a considerable amount of travel, my energies have been fully focused on preparing for the launch of the Africa Seed Investment Fund, a $12 million investment facility to be managed by African Agricultural Capital. The facility is the brainchild of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa and will offer medium to long term capital to seed businesses in eight countries in East & Southern Africa.

The African seed industry has (alongside most other agricultural sectors) been starved of investment capital. As a result, there is a significant deficit in high quality certified seed available to farmers across the region. This deficit, along with the questionable quality of this most essential of all farming inputs, is a substantial contributor to the poor agricultural productivity and efficiency endemic to the region. The Africa Seed Investment Fund offers the opportunity to seed businesses to access the capital they require in order to increase seed production volumes, seed quality and take advantage of the opportunity to commercialise new improved seed varieties - the fruits of research and development work carried out by both national and international plant breeding programmes.

The launch was held on April 2nd in Kampala. Now the hard work of identifying, researching, evaluating and negotiating investment agreements will start.

The war on.... something or other

Last week, there was a very interesting editorial in the Economist, providing a strong argument for the decriminalisation of drugs. It's not a difficult argument to make: first, it drew attention to the abject failure of the high cost "war on drugs"; second, it highlighted the likely health and fiscal benefits from a properly managed and regulated trade in drugs; and third, it made the point that the criminalisation of drugs drives the trade underground and leads to increased crime and violence around the world. Recent drug-related violence in Mexico is widely reported, but the drug trade is now well-established in West Africa and, increasingly, there are rumours that East Africa is becoming a transit zone for drug smuggling, with all the attendant social risks this brings.

By coincidence, I have just re-read Ben Elton's novel, High Society, which centres on a hitherto-little-known politician's ultimately unsuccessful campaign to decriminalise drugs, set against the backdrop of drug use and abuse across British society. It's a very good novel, blending satire, humour and typically savage social observation. Indeed, while no-one, least of all Ben Elton himself, I suspect, would say that he is a great writer, he is a wonderful commentator on many of the big issues of our time. In one memorable passage, the lead character, Peter Paget, compares the absurdity of the "war on drugs" to the USA's failure with alcohol prohibition. "That one insane experiment [prohibition] tells us everything we need to know about drug control. People didn't drink less, they just drank illegally. They paid no tax, some of them went blind from wood alcohol, and they financed the birth of organized crime that has plagued American society ever since."

Each publication made a compelling case for decriminalisation: taken together, the argument is overwhelming. The "war on drugs" cannot be won.

So why are most Governments around the world so wedded to the "war on drugs"? It's an interesting question, for which there seem to be two main possible answers. First, they know it, but consider the social consequences of decriminalisation to be worse than fighting the long, expensive and inevitable defeat. Second, and a more cynical explanation, waging "wars" is a convenient way by which Governments are able to subjugate and control the populace, both through the erosion of hard-won civil and individual liberties (as has been so clearly demonstrated in the "war on terror") and through the creation of an external bogeyman, whose wicked and malign intentions threaten the very fabric of our society, and who provides the justification for excessive regulation and intrusion into the way in which individuals choose to live their lives.

Recently, I read an extraordinary item on the news: namely, that the British Government was seeking to introduce a system that required anyone leaving the UK to disclose their travel plans in advance. This will, apparently, assist in the control over two bogeymen, terrorism and organised crime. It probably will, but what sort of society do we want to live in? Every new regulation is justifiable, taken in isolation, but they make each one of us just a little less free than before.

Of Bentleys, Soil, Seeds and Marram Roads

Experts in African agriculture disagree over the most critical limiting factor on agricultural performance. Most believe that improvements in agricultural inputs are essential. Increase productivity – the argument goes – and resulting production surpluses will create an environment in which agricultural markets will become larger and more sustainable. A few believe that well-functioning markets are the key: markets, they argue, provide confidence to farmers to invest in improving production efficiency.

Within the inputs camp, there is a further division. Better planting material or better soil health – which is the critical factor? One of AAC’s directors, Walter Vandepitte, likened the use of highly engineered hybrid seeds on impoverished soils to “driving a Ferrari along a marram road”. The seed advocate will argue in response that adoption of improved seeds will lead farmers to increase their use of fertilizers, irrigation and crop protection products to safeguard their crops, increase yields and, indirectly, improve soil health.

I am not qualified to provide an opinion on these arguments, but it does seem to me to be self-evident that even the best and most robust planting material is useless if grown in unsuitable soil conditions. Gardeners and farmers have always known this – indeed, before the dawn of manufactured fertilisers and crop protection products, they used to practice systems of crop rotation: on the logic that the nutrients taken out of soil by crops need to be replaced.

East African soils are fragile and vulnerable. A great deal of land is given over to monoculture, especially maize. The sun is strong, baking exposed soil and depleting nutrients. Rainfall is frequently heavy and can wash away topsoil. Few farmers compost organic material or have access to sufficient animal manure for fertilizer. All these factors combine to cause rapid depletion in soil nutrients and, if unchecked, result in soil acidification and ultimate infertility. This is a very serious problem.

One of AAC’s investees is a company called Lachlan Kenya (http://www.griculture.co.ke/) Based in Nairobi, this company distributes and markets a wide range of crop protection products throughout East Africa. Recognizing the importance of effective soil management products, the business also distributes a range of micro-nutrient fertilizers (especially important in horticulture), humic acid (which accelerates the decomposition of organic material in the soil and facilitates the uptake of nutrients) and, most interesting of all, a nitrogen-fixing biological fertilizer marketed under the brand name Twin-N. These products, and others, all have potential to improve soil health, something which is urgently required in much of East Africa.

Returning to the analogy of the absurdity of driving a Ferrari on a marram road, anyone who has visited Kampala recently will know that the city’s roads are afflicted by potholes and that a 4WD vehicle is almost a necessity in certain areas. Picture my surprise, then, when I saw an extremely handsome Bentley (registration number JH) cruising the city streets a few days ago. Subsequent research revealed that the Bentley’s owner is a young lady called Judith Heard (picture above). Kampala residents are no strangers to exotic vehicles – Hummers and Lexuses are frequently sighted – but most at least pay lip service to the necessity of having a high clearance vehicle. For sheer chutzpah, there is something wonderfully impractical about a Bentley which takes it straight to the top of the show-off chart. Bravo Ms Heard!

Schloss Kifufu

The Kifufu estate lies on the foothills of Mt Kilimanjaro. Originally developed by a German settler in Tanganyika, the estate was developed as a coffee plantation, and the condition of the basic estate infrastructure bears witness to the quality of German engineering. The estate was recently leased by one of AAC's investees (the well-named Africado) and is being replanted to avocado trees. Here's a picture of the General Manager's castle with the stunning backdrop of Kilimanjaro.

A few years ago, when it was under CDC's ownership and management, I periodically used to visit the Rwenzori Highlands Tea company in Western Uganda. From the main estate, there was an equally fabulous view of the snow-capped Rwenzori mountains. Everyone who visited the estate marvelled at the view, much to the irritation of one estate manager's wife who would acknowledge its beauty but also observe, a little sadly, that "You can't live on a view". True enough, but it certainly helps assuage the loneliness of life on a plantation.

Avocado trees grow very well in parts of East Africa. Africado is planting the much-in-demand Hass variety at Kifufu and plans to distribute seedling trees from its nursery to smallholder farmers in the vicinity. By aggregating smallholder-grown avocados with its own estate production and shipping to high value European markets, the business has solid prospects - and will provide smallholders with another option (apart from coffee production) for a high value tree crop.

Africa for sale

There has been a spate of announcements and news items in recent weeks about the acquisition of African land by foreign governments and investors for the purpose of food production. While not quite on the scale of the colonial era, this trend raises numerous questions over the role of government, over food security, over land ownership and over the rights of African smallholders and pastoralists (who, one fears, will be displaced from customary land to make way for large-scale agriculture).

Many economists seem to think that this is a good thing. They point to employment creation, infrastructure investment and increased agricultural efficiency. To be sure, in an environment where population growth remains rapid, where inadequate infrastructure hampers communication and distribution and where agriculture is, in general, extremely inefficient, the potential benefits are substantial.

And that's the key word - potential. Historically, I am sorry to say, Africa is littered with investment failures in large scale agricultural projects. Most famous among these is the Tanganyika groundnut scheme. This plan, to cultivate a large area of modern-day Tanzania with groundnuts, was a catastrophe in every way (see Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tanganyika_groundnut_scheme for the full story - which is almost comical in its catalogue of disaster). It is, however, by no means unique.

The latest investment fad has centred around the production of biofuels and, in particular, a plant called jatropha curcas. This plant, it is claimed, will yield four times as much fuel as soya, and will thrive in semi-arid conditions unsuitable for almost any other commercial crop. To go back to a theme running through this blog, just remember, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

What can the new investors learn from past and present mistakes? Three things stand out: the importance of research; experimentation and pilot programmes; and the need to invest in management and training. Simple, really.

Leaving aside these long term issues, let's hope that the details of these transactions are made public and that the proceeds are used first to compensate smallholders and pastoralists who have been or will be affect by the proposed developments, and second to invest in long term improvements to infrastructure. Sometimes it's good to be an optimist: in the words of David Landes "...pessimism offers little more than the hollow satisfaction of being proved right"

Quelea Quelea

Last week I had the pleasure of visiting Dar es Salaam. During my visit, I spent a couple of hours in conversation with the CEO of Kilombero Plantations. This business owns a substantial estate at Mngeta in the Kilombero Valley, Southern Tanzania, and, now that the rains have started, is busy planting rice. Amid our lively discussions, he mentioned the potential threat from the "Kwela Kwela" bird (pictured above). This little creature is generally considered to be the most numerous bird in the world and, due to its habit of descending in vast clouds on arable crops and stripping them bare in a matter of hours, is often called the Locust bird. Needless to say, as part of any risk management strategy for an arable farm, the risk of a Quelea Quelea invasion needs careful consideration.

On my flight back to Uganda, I began to think a lot more about the difficulties of crop protection in an environment like the Kilombero Valley. Sandwiched between the Udzungwa mountains and the Selous Game Reserve, this valley is vast, low-lying, humid and remote. It is an environmental hotspot, filled with migratory routes, wetlands, and rare and endangered species. There are also numerous attendant social issues, including ethnic migration, land ownership, poverty and public health concerns. Under these circumstances, threats to agricultural enterprise are extensive. Large mammals (elephant, buffalo, hippo) can cause huge amounts of damage. Rodents and monkeys present risks. Army worms, thripps and other insect pests are liable to launch attacks. Quelea Quelea can descend, literally, out of the blue. And local human residents may regard edible grain crops as fair game for pilferage.

In a situation like this, an Integrated Pest Management (IPM) approach is critical. Without taking an IPM approach, the only options are (1) to accept significant crop loss or (2) to invest in hugely expensive fencing and access control systems, either of which are normally unacceptable to agriculturalists for financial reasons, or (3) to use chemicals (in practice poisons) which are usually unacceptable to all other stakeholders for environmental, health and safety reasons. Indeed, the normal "solutions" for Quelea Quelea are either napalming nest colonies (!) or the use of highly toxic organophosphate poisons, niether of which are generally considered environmentally acceptable, especially in an environment as fragile and sensitive as the Kilombero Valley.

One of AAC's first investments was in a business called Real IPM. Located in Thika, Kenya, this business was established in 2005 by two entrepreneurs with a vision to bring IPM solutions to the Kenyan horticulture industry. We were attracted by this vision for a number of reasons: first, it presented an opportunity to invest in a business bringing improved technology and know-how to horticulture in the region; second, it offered a solution which promised, if adopted, to reduce the use of potentially harmful chemicals in the horticulture industry; and third it appeared to be a sound business proposition. I had first become aware of IPM as a strategy to reduce chemical usage and cost during my association about four years earlier with a large floriculture business located in Naivasha. This business had employed a young British scientist to develop an IPM programme and, though initially skeptical, I had after visiting been convinced that the system should be scaled up from the pilot phase.

IPM has developed enormously over the past 20 years or more, gathering pace with the growth of the organic movement. Though traditionally focused on insect pests, IPM is practiced over a wide range of crops. In oil palm plantations, for example, where rodents (rats) are a damaging pest, the highly effective IPM technique of siting nesting boxes for barn owls at an appropriate density is the optimal control mechanism. Famously, the Elephant Pepper trust in Zimbabwe has pioneered the cultivation of birds eye chilli peppers as a border - and cash - crop to protect farmers against elephant incursion using the slogan "Elephants hate chilli" And some growers use sun hemp, again as a border crop, to protect against baboons and other monkey species incursions. IPM solutions also include the use of beneficial fungus species (eg trichoderma) to protect against nematode worms, and doubtless research and product development for further crop protection solutions will continue apace.

For the sake of African arable farmers, including Kilombero Plantations, let's hope that a solution for the Quelea Quelea threat presents itself in the near future. All suggestions are gratefully received.

Sir Roger and the Congo

Once again, the Congo is in the forefront of the media for all the wrong reasons. Civil war, displacement, rape, murder, ethnic cleansing, corruption.... a more talented writer than I described it as "Pandora's box without the hope" and it's hard to escape this conclusion.

I don't know Congo at all well: I have only made one visit, yet it is strangely fascinating. My first memory was of the Rumble in the Jungle, when Muhammed Ali defeated George Foreman in heavyweight boxing. My second was reading Conrad's Heart of Darkness. In the light of what has come afterwards, who can forget the following quote "The conquest of the earth, which mostly means the taking it away from those who have a different complexion or slightly flatter noses than ourselves, is not a pretty thing when you look into it too much." Certainly Leopold's conquest of the Congo was, even by the standards of imperialism as a whole, not a pretty thing. The supposed Congo Free State in which Leopold and his mercenaries established a centralised government solely for the purpose of looting the country of its rubber, its ivory and its minerals. Adam Hochschild's wonderful book, King Leopold's Ghost, describes the numerous atrocities inflicted on the Congolese people - and first alerted me to the role played by Sir Roger Casement in exposing these atrocities to the outside world.

Sir Roger Casement (pictured above) is an intriguing character. Knighted for his humanitarian services first to the people of the Congo and then for carrying out a similar expose on the abuses and cruelty inflicted on Putumayo indians in the Amazon basin, he fell spectacularly from grace due to his support for the Irish nationalist party, Sinn Fein. Latterly tried, convicted and executed for treason - following his bungled attempt to further the Irish rebellion with German support during the first World War - his life story presents a mystery to biographers and historians. This mystery is not only in his public life, but also in his private life - publicised by his English accusers in the form of the infamous black diaries - which describe in some detail his homosexual escapades. But perhaps it is not so difficult: he was undoubtedly a sensitive and kind man, and the horrors of imperial exploitation first in Congo and then in the Amazon - must have led him to think about the English occupation of Ireland....

Sir Roger's other tragedy is that despite his intervention, and that of his friend and tireless human rights campaigner E D Morel, the legacy of Leopold's Congo has proved so strong. From the Belgian abandonment in 1960, to Patrice Lumumba's assassination, to the long and disastrous rule of Mobutu Sese Seko, to the accession (and assassination) of the brutal Laurent Kabila, to the "democratic" elections two years ago which presented Congolese with a choice between the inept Joseph Kabila and war criminal Jean-Pierre Bemba, to Laurent Nkunda's latest incursion ostensibly to protect Tutsi minorities in the East, so little has changed.

For me, Congo exemplifies three things. First, the wicked and enduring scar left by colonialism on Africa. Second, the curse of abundant natural resources in an environment where the biggest fists are all that matter. Third, the hideous impact of systematic corruption on justice and the rule of law. What next for the people of the Congo?

Oba-mania

There have been huge celebrations in Kenya, Uganda and (I'm sure) the rest of Africa following the election of Barack Obama. That a son of a Kenyan immigrant should have risen from humble beginnings to the most powerful position in the world is a remarkable achievement, and will undoubtedly be a source of great pride and inspiration to people everywhere, but most specially in Africa. Following two long campaigns, in which he first defeated the redoubtable Hilary Clinton and then the doughty John McCain, no-one can dispute his credentials.

For me, however, the most interesting thing about the election will be its reverberations across Africa in the next four years. For how much longer will Africans accept ageing leaders who cling to power through profoundly undemocratic systems? When will the simple message for change, embodied in the three words "yes we can", start to spread through Africa? Until recently, poor communications have stifled political campaigning by opposition groups, but the internet and the cell phone are changing that, and fast. The instruments of mass communication are no longer under government control. In winning the election, Obama may be the catalyst for change in Africa and for the transfer of political power to the new generation. Even more than elsewhere, support by the young in Africa is critical for change to take place. Population growth and demographics mean that the overwhelming majority of the African electorate is under 40 years of age. Leaders who are able to win and harness their support will create the future.

Many people I meet harbour negative perceptions about Africa. They complain about corruption and bemoan conflict. My response to this is to point to the remarkable tenacity and determination of most African people, who achieve great things in spite of all the obstacles placed in their path. Barack Obama is a shining example of this tenacity and determination, but there are many others like him in Africa, in commerce, in industry, in education and even in politics, who will shape the future of this young continent. Make no mistake, Africa's future is bright.

Trees and Honey

Very few days go by in this job wthout learning something new and interesting. A few years ago, when I was working for CDC, I learnt a lot about the cultivation and export of fresh vegetables. Subsequently, my colleagues found my extensive knowledge of vegetables a source of great amusement, though I could never see the joke.....

Over the past two months, two more areas have caught my interest and attention. Trees and honey. Trees - and more specifically the lack of them - is a fairly obvious one. Here are a few facts: East Africa's trees produce about 80% of the population's energy requirements (who ever said biofuels were something new?); population growth - and land pressure - is rising at about 4% per annum. To put this in context, that means the population of Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania will double within 20 years! Forest cover is diminishing: in Kenya, forests now cover less than 2% of the area. Tanzania and Uganda are slightly better, but the trend is sharply down... Timber prices are increasing all the time....

Now, I knew all this before. What I didn't know, until attending an excellent presentation by Eric Bettelheim of Sustainable Forestry Management last week in Kigali, was that Africa had been unable to benefit from the official market in carbon trading established under the Kyoto Protocol a few years ago. If, therefore, a government or a private individual or business plants trees in Africa, s/he is ineligible for carbon credits - which are available to European and North American growers! The result - deforestation continues apace in the developing world but afforestation is on the increase in Europe and the USA. And I thought it was a global problem....... Fortunately, however, the business case for planting forests in East Africa is becoming very persuasive, even without the carrot of carbon trading opportunities, and, if Mr Bettelheim gets his way, the economics may look even better in the near future. Buy land and plant some trees - in today's fragile economic environment, that advice could be a great long term pension investment, besides doing something small to save the planet.

And if you plant some trees, why not invest in some beehives? The bees do all the work and you collect the income. Furthermore, the global honey price is increasing, due mostly to the impact of bee disease in USA & Europe and the consequent reduction in bee colonies. Beeswax, propolis and royal jelly, alongside the honey, and cross-pollination for your tree crops to boot.

If you want to learn some more, visit http://www.sfm.bm/. Think about it.

Visiting Rwanda

Or, more accurately, Kigali for the Commonwealth Business Council Investment Forum for East Africa.

My first encounter with Rwanda was in 1994, when I was working for the International Red Cross Federation's regional delegation in Nairobi. As an accountant, my job for a short period was to deliver huge sums of cash to the relief effort in Goma and Bukavu, just across the Congo border. The weekly consignments averaged about $500,000 in cash - mixed denominations, 1999 series or later. By keeping the process low-profile, I managed to avoid becoming a target myself, but it was an uncomfortable, but very necessary task. At the time the banking system in Eastern Congo (Zaire) had broken down completely, so cash was the only means of financing the massive relief operation.

Since then, I have been back on a number of occasions, always with delight at the visible and tangible progress since the dark days of 1994. Most memorably, I made a trip in 2002 to Ruhengeri to visit mountain gorillas. I had tagged a day visit on the end of a business trip to Kigali and as a result was extremely badly equipped for the short hike up the mountain to the forest. It had rained the night before, as we left early in the morning, the valleys were cloud-filled but the hills clear. The image of the deep green "mille collines" floating in a sea of white clouds in the early morning sunlight is unforgettable, yet it pales by comparison with the sight of a family group of 15-20 mountain gorillas.

Kigali is clean, orderly and functional but, in comparison with the hustle and bustle of other East African commercial centres, strangely devoid of apparent colour and energy. There is a reserve and a sense of watchfulness which leaves the visitor with a sense of remoteness....

As for the conference, well, I was very interested in about 20% of the agenda. Protocols observed, there were some very interesting discussions on the future of agriculture and forestry in Africa (both of which are close to my heart) and, as is always the case, a good opportunity to meet a range of useful contacts. Sadly, the session on financial inclusion - the delivery of appropriate financial services to the unbanked majority - was disappointingly bland. The simple fact is that banks in East Africa are extremely profitable and simply do not need to invest in delivering banking services into rural areas. Furthermore, they are far too costly - tending, as everywhere else in the world - to grow fat on the huge and indefensible spreads between customer deposit interest rates and borrowing rates.... Am I alone in thinking that there is something fundamentally wrong when bankers are the highest paid segment of the workforce?

I hope I will be back in Rwanda soon. And I hope, next time, that I will be able to see something more than a hotel, a taxi, a conference centre and an airport. On the flight back this morning, I realised that I had in all honesty had no contact with Rwanda... again. East Africans, international delegates, foreign-owned and managed organisations, but nothing that brought me any closer to a relationship or an understanding of Rwanda. The remoteness remains.