Togo's economyWarren Wagstaff — North Vancouver, BC 
As we waited on the airport tarmac for the stairway to be pushed up to the plane we couldn’t help but wonder what lay ahead for us in this tiny country of five million. When we walked down the stairs to the waiting bus the smell of burning charcoal filled the air. It soon became apparent that this was the smell of an entrepreneurial nation — entrepreneurial by necessity. Our journey from the airport to our hotel in Lome, the capital, took thirty-five minutes. As we drove through the streets we could see one-story buildings housing shop after shop, their interiors lit by a single oil candle illuminating shelves nearly barren, or for the fortunate merchant, fully stocked. We soon learned of rolling power outages of up to twelve hours a day. 
The streets were packed with tables large and small as street merchants offered a multitude of knickknacks for sale. A small 2' x 3' table holding old whiskey bottles full of diesel, gas, or motor oil — a gas station. Within a few feet sat a woman frying yams in a two-and-a-half foot diameter bowl of oil perched over a charcoal fire. The man next to her held a saw, a hammer, and a chisel — his ‘store’ or spot on the sidewalk was a furniture store. There are thousands and thousands of small businesses located everywhere in Togo. Poverty is everywhere, but the local people are oblivious to it — they are too preoccupied with earning a living. With an annual income of around $1 to $1.50 a day in the rural farm areas and $3 to $3.50 a day in central Lome, putting food on the table is the main daily activity. Fruits and vegetables are plentiful and inexpensive by our standards, forty cents for a pineapple or twenty cents for a mango, but expensive for the locals. Few locals told us of eating fruits and vegetables. Most eat corn for breakfast, rice for lunch, and rice or beans for dinner, if anything at all. It seems the government promises many things but does not deliver. There is no public transport, no municipal toilets, no parks, education and health care is a pay-as-you-go system. It is said that corruption is rampant, public goods are stolen and misused with little benefit flowing to the common man. With so many small street businesses it seemed impossible that they could be taxed. We were assured that they were. A government tax collector visits each street vendor daily imposing a 10% tax on goods displayed. Building-based businesses are taxed monthly. There is no income tax.  A full 80% of the population resides in rural locations as farmers. Agriculture is the mainstay of the GDP in Togo. Mangoes, corn, yams, pineapples, vegetables are the main crops. There are two growing seasons and crop prices plummet when harvest begins as an over supply of goods hits the markets. Everything is of value here. You see discarded chunks of concrete being broken by hand to extract the iron reinforcing bar, fresh garbage being scoured for valuable items, discarded food being scavenged. Lome is a beehive of activity and a sea of humanity. Motorbikes with two or three people on them, or piled high with hundred-pound bags of rice or veggies roar by. Beat-up taxis and old cars rattle by alongside the occasional BMW or Mercedes of the privileged few. The ingenuity of the people is remarkable. A few examples of street-based businesses:
Life expectancy in Togo is fifty-one for males and fifty-five for females with the average age of Togo somewhere under thirty with few older people visible. There may not be a lot of work available in Togo but there are many ’jobs’ — jobs created by the people for themselves so they can provide for their families and themselves — jobs that they do with a smile and with pride. Togo is a remarkable place. |
