Buhari striking one deal with Coca Cola could double the size of Nigeria’s economy within five years

By Ayo Akinfe

(1) Over the last the week, the unfortunate xenophobic attacks in South Africa have drowned out the news that the country hosted the World Economic Forum (Wef) summit. This was supposed to be a gathering where the whole world debated how to grow Africa’s combined gross domestic product (GDP) but alas, that is now no longer of any interest to anyone

(2) Our own esteemed Professor Yemi Osinbajo was due to address the summit in South Africa. Knowing Prof, I am in no doubt that he would have come up with several mind-blowing proposals at the summit. Whether they would have been acted upon, however, is another matter. This is why sometimes, it is easier to get results in small gatherings or through bilateral deals as you cut some of the bureaucracy, infighting and disagreements associated with large groupings. We recently saw this with Ghana and Toyota, where they quietly reached a deal to open an assembly plant

(3) Just appreciating the challenge the Wef faces, Africa only accounts for 4% of global trade and more shockingly only accounts for $2.1trn of the world’s $80trn GDP. There are 7.7bn humans on earth of which day 1.3bn are African. Basically, 16% of humanity are living off 2.6% of its wealth. This is simply not sustainable over the long term, so it is not surprising that South African youths are resorting to xenophobic attacks. A hungry man can never be a reasonable man

(4) In the past, I have written that Wef summits have failed because they did not set compulsory foreign direct investment (FDI) targets for Africa. If the FTSE 100 index companies were all compelled by law to invest just 1% of their turnover in Africa, the economic situation would change overnight

(5) Talking about growth and the elimination of poverty when only 2.6% of the world’s capital is invested in Africa is downright hypocritical and nonsensical. If the industrialised world is honest about lifting Africa out of penury, they should invest in wealth creation across the continent

(6) In this regard, Nigeria has got a massive joker up her sleeve and I am perplexed that no president so far has found it fit to use it. Do you know that Coca Cola started off using kolanuts as its primary ingredient? Well, Nigeria accounts for 45% of global kolanut production with an annual output of 132,000 tonnes. We easily dominate the world market and were kolanuts as important to the global economy as say crude oil, Nigeria would be a top five economy

(7) Now, this is where Nigeria has to learn from the West. When anything is important to their economies, they get laws passed describing them as environmentally friendly and compulsory. If we could get the United Nations, Wef, Unesco, Unicef, the World Health Organisation, etc to demand that at the very minimum, every can of Coca Cola must contain 15% kolanuts, Nigeria is sorted. It would be a licence to print money

(8) John Pemberton, the pharmacist who started Coca Cola, decided to use his pharmaceutical skills to develop a cure for his morphine addiction, so he started experimenting with various plants, including kolanuts. In 1866, he started selling an alcoholic drink named Pemberton’s French Wine Coca and that is how it all began. Today, Coca Cola no longer has any kolanuts in it as it made up of artificial and synthetic ingredients but we need to change this. Our argument should be it is unorganic, unhealthy, injurious to human life, environmentally unfriendly and polluting, etc to use artificial products in Coca Cola. If we can win that argument, poverty will be banished in Nigeria overnight

(9) Today, Coca Cola sells about 2bn bottles or cans a day. Just imagine if every helping had 15% kolanuts in it. Think of how much this would generate for Nigerian producers daily, how much output would expand and how many jobs it would create. We need to play hard ball here and get Coca Cola classified as a drug unless it contains kolanuts

(10) President Buhari has to take the lead on this one. Were I in his shoes I would offer Coca Cola a deal that involved me being conciliatory if they opened can and bottle manufacturing operations, machinery production factories and more bottling and canning plants in Nigeria. All their trucks too must be assembled in Nigeria. In exchange for that, we will not demand that their drink must be 100% kolanuts