seen from France
seen from Canada
seen from Philippines
seen from Türkiye
seen from China
seen from Malaysia
seen from Germany
seen from United States
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Try again, los cerillos mas complejos de encender... al menos te entregan una depilacion olorosa por el mismo esfuerzo. #cuerodechancho #chagua #burn (en Santiago de cali) https://www.instagram.com/p/Buq6o3ogrEcpisBOR_SJamisBPodPE__o0oy9I0/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=1lpw55whstbl7
African nations are fed up with the West’s hand-me-downs. But it’s tough to keep them out.
By Max Bearak and David J. Lynch, Washington Post, May 29, 2018
KIGALI, Rwanda--When spring cleaning comes around in the United States, dropping well-loved clothes into a donation box can feel like an act of selflessness. Those stained sweaters, summer camp T-shirts and out-of-fashion shorts will clothe someone needier, right?
It’s actually a little more complicated. Most of America’s castoff clothes are sold by the Salvation Army, Goodwill and others to private companies. Bales of used clothing are then shipped by the container-load, mostly to sub-Saharan Africa, in what has become a billion-dollar industry.
African governments have become increasingly fed up. What many in the West think of as a gesture of generosity, they say, is preventing them from building their own apparel industries. In March 2016, four East African countries decided to raise tariffs on used clothing, in some cases to as much as 20 times the previous rate.
The American used-clothing lobby sounded the alarm, and last year, the Trump administration began investigating whether the four nations were violating an 18-year-old trade agreement with the United States. Under pressure, the East African governments lowered their tariffs to previous rates.
Except Rwanda.
Now, a Rwandan leader who styles himself as a proud visionary is suffering the consequences of his decision to stand up to Washington.
This week, Rwanda faces the suspension of some of its duty-free trading privileges pertaining to clothing under the African Growth and Opportunity Act. Its efforts to foster a domestic clothing industry, meanwhile, have yielded few results. And Rwandans who work in the used-clothing business are complaining that they are suffering.
The deadlock between the world’s economic giant and one of Africa’s fastest-growing economies doesn’t exactly qualify as a trade war--it’s more like a scuffle. Rwanda’s total used-clothing imports were less than 7 percent of all of East Africa’s in 2016, according to government statistics. And its clothing exports to the United States were a minuscule $2 million.
But it reflects the difficulties that even a low-wage country like Rwanda can have developing an industry in an intensely competitive global market.
President Paul Kagame is betting that he can kick-start Rwandan manufacturing while weaning his country off the used clothing he sees as undignified. He is one of a number of African leaders who want to stem a tide of used items--from clothes to electronics to medical equipment--that end up on the continent after someone else has gotten rid of them.
“As far as I am concerned, making the choice is simple,” Kagame told reporters last June, referring to the trade dispute. “We might suffer consequences.” However, he said, Rwanda and other countries in the region “have to grow and establish our industries.”
Rwanda, like other East African countries, used to produce most of its own clothes. But in the 1980s, regional leaders worked with the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund to open up their economies and permit greater trade. That resulted in an influx of cheap imports. Political turmoil, including the Rwandan genocide in 1994, further harmed the local industry.
Kagame’s government recently launched “Made in Rwanda,” a campaign to encourage and subsidize local production. It has, however, made scant progress so far.
Rwanda suffers from numerous competitive disadvantages. It is landlocked and far from shipping ports; its domestic market is tiny and mostly poor; and it lacks a trained workforce. It won’t become the next Vietnam or Bangladesh anytime soon.
While the Rwandan apparel industry has barely grown, the country’s used-clothing business--known as “chagua,” from the Swahili word “choose”--has taken a hit from the new tariffs. The business employs more than 18,000 people here.
“I’ve had to triple my prices,” said Zaetzev Sibomana, 26, who sells used clothes at Nyamirambo market in Kigali, Rwanda’s capital. “What they’ve done is kill this business and with it my savings. I still live at my parents’ house, you know?”
The owners of the shops adjacent to his have gone on to sell the cheap Chinese apparel that is now replacing American used clothing. While inexpensive, the Chinese clothing is new and thus not subject to the same tariffs.
Isai Mugabo, one of those shop owners, lamented the change. Chagua was more dignified than the Chinese clothing because it allowed people to feel stylish, he said.
“Most of my customers leave my shop unsatisfied. They are used to finding something unique, but now everyone leaves with the same shirt,” he said. “It is like a Chinese uniform that everyone now walks around in.”
In the short term, China could be the beneficiary of the trade dispute. In its review of the East African countries’ hike in tariffs on used clothing, the U.S. Trade Representative’s Office argued that Chinese imports “pose a much greater danger to East African domestic industries” than American secondhand apparel.
Chinese clothing exports to East Africa reached $1.2 billion in 2016, “dwarfing the value of used clothing by a factor of four,” the agency wrote.
Kigali’s purveyors of used clothing say they and their customers have been left in the lurch by the trade shifts.
“Listen, in Rwanda, what we want are permanent things: clothes that last long, jobs that last long, industry that lasts long,” said Nadine Ingabire, who has sold chagua for a decade. “We are not there yet. We need chagua until we get there. We need that choice. Having only chagua isn’t great, but neither is only having cheap Chinese clothes. And to those who say ‘Buy Rwandan-made clothing,’ I say, not everyone can afford a whole wardrobe full of your best Sunday church outfits.”
Morning jam. Can't get enough. I'm a fan. So uwongo @benadyinady #chagua
Del decalogo #tapatio las #pitayas se comen en las 9 esquinas. No duran para el dia siguiente ni se meten al refri. Se te sigue sigue extrañando #chagua
drunk Nyagua is way too good for lyfe so I'm bout to go on a reblogging spree of the text posts she has been gracious enough to share with us on this lovely evening (morning?)
I'm also going to add her tags onto the end of each post because those are works of genius as well
