From Africa Recovery, Vol.13#4 (December 1999), page 25 (part of special feature on information technology)
Electronic commerce is up and running in Senegal through the electronic network of "trade points" launched by the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). Trade Point Senegal started up in Dakar in 1996 as a public and private sector joint initiative to facilitate local access to business opportunities on the global Trade Points network.
Linking Senegalese importers and exporters with the foreign public and private sector -- customs, banks, insurance companies, transporters -- also has the underlying aim of simplifying business rules and procedures for more efficient trade, says marketing manager Ibrahima Diagne.
Results have been "very positive" even though placing new information and communication technologies (ICTs) at the service of mostly illiterate traders was not an obvious recipe for success. So far, over 1,000 business opportunities from Senegal have been advertised on the Trade Points network, half of them getting promising replies. Some 40 Senegalese entrepreneurs have made confirmed deals. The rest were reluctant to provide further information, "perhaps fearing we would tell the tax authorities," Mr. Diagne adds.
Trade Point Senegal has also begun to decentralize, with help from the Acacia Initiative of the Canadian International Development Research Centre (IDRC). Its offices in Thiès, Joal, Mboro, Ross Béthio, St. Louis and Podor have even recorded better business results for these agricultural and fishing communities than for Dakar in a comparable month of operations.
Since Trade Point Senegal aims to raise awareness of electronic commerce, the fact that traders are seeing the business benefits of using ICTs is a source of satisfaction. And illiteracy is not a real obstacle. Most ordinary people, not just the illiterate, tend to feel excluded from new technology at first. So "we try to demystify the tool. We tell them that behind the telephone, there is some very complicated technology. But we all pick up the phone and dial a number. So understand that the computer is as banal as the phone. We approach people and get them to express their needs. We show them that they can use the technology without necessarily having the skills themselves. With our training programmes, they will eventually learn computer skills themselves. But in this first phase, we help them get results. The key is for traders to see one of their own making some money, then they become enthusiastic. We try to raise awareness in all business sectors -- particularly the micro-, small and medium enterprises -- about a new tool that can benefit them all."
Trade Point Senegal began working last August with a thousand women in various small businesses in the densely populated Guediawaye area of Dakar. It demonstrated its services to them and got some to pay the annual CFA 2,500 franc registration fee (under $5). Some women sent e-mail messages offering potential deals. "Just two days later, they were astonished to receive some enquiries. So they are now extremely enthusiastic."
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