The Trump return sends an olive branch to Tanzania

SHOCKING to many, President elect Donald Trump was declared a winner by major media outlets in America on Wednesday, 5th November 2024 against expectations of many pundits, including former President Obama, who predicted that election results would delay by many days after votes were cast on November 4th 2024, similar to what happened in the year 2020.

Now it’s obvious that Mr Trump has already won with 312 electoral college votes and more than 76 million popular votes, the highest of any Republican President in the history of the country.

With Grand Old Party’s (GOP) dominance of in both sides of the Congress (House of Representatives and Senate) and Supreme court, many in the political circles finds it lukewarm to call that victory a win but a mandate given to him by the American electorate.

Significance of this election, as it is the case to all United States elections, is that it is not confined in the borders of this country, thanks to its broad economic tentacles that reaches to almost nation on earth.

Well, as it was expected, it’s reported that Trump administration will come with crippling tariff on many of Chinese products imported to the American market.

Knowing that US is a major market for many of its products, China has promised to retaliate when the measure will act upon.

Currently, US is reeling from reduced Soya export, an occasion that negatively affects its farmers. To hit where it pains, it’s highly likely that China will include soya in the list of products who tariffs will be increased.

Usually, tariffs tend to make the product to be too expensive in the market making it less preferred by the consumers. In other words, tariffs are one of the tools used by countries useful at discouraging imports for a number of reasons.

Taking cognisance of the first Trump administration, which saw unexpected trade war between these two countries starting the year 2018, it is highly likely that the same will happen this time around.

In that era China had to figure out an alternative source of soya supplies to fill in the deficit of about 20 million tonnes of soya beans to feed its piggery industry with protein rich animal feed.

It’s certain that even with the projected increase in Brazil’s soya beans production that gap will be too big to fill. This is where Tanzania comes in.

Tanzania is not a significant player in soya beans export. While international trade records shows that average soya beans exports of Tanzania 100,000 tonnes, the highest amount the country can produce is roughly 40,000 tonnes.

Where is the other 60,000 tonnes coming from? Your guess is as good as mine, it’s coming from the neighbours, Malawi and Zambia.

Yes, much as Malawi and Zambia are not that visible internationally, they are the shakers and movers in the regional soya business and the pace is likely slowing down any time soon. Zambia and Malawi can each muster an annual production that us around 400,000 and 200,000 tonnes respectively.

Tanzania tends to import a significant amount from them all to feed its local livestock industry while the rest is re-exported.

In the darks days between China and United States of America, China took a rather bold step to sign an MoU that would give Tanzania’s soya beans export a preferential treatment in its market.

This was to be followed by a reverberating increase in local prices for soya beans. During that period the country witnessed rise of price by more than 200 per cent which was quite unprecedented.

Many farmers were encouraged to produce them even to those who were not located in traditionally soya beans producing areas.

The demand for soya improved seeds were over the roof, which forced Tanzania to give permits to companies to import them from neighbouring countries.

If someone is observing things in the way I do, will conclude that history is likely to repeat itself this time around and those who are in the arena will do needful to cease the moment