Ministry of Trade: The Bitter Reality and the Longing for Reform

Jamal al-Din Mohamed Saleh

Introduction
The importance of the Ministry of Trade stems from the fact that the economy is the lifeblood of society. Production is the foundation of the economy and the basis upon which the economic structure is built. The strength of an economy depends on the strength of that foundation. Trade — by which I mean commercial activity — is the engine that drives production. The Ministry of Trade, meanwhile, is the captain of the ship and the driver of the locomotive. It is responsible for reading the compass, determining the routes, controlling the speed and dealing with breakdowns to ensure a safe arrival.

Skillful and professional management of the locomotive ensures that the dangers along the way are avoided and the objectives of the journey are achieved. This is clearly reflected in the history of the Ministry. Whenever the Ministry played an active role in managing and directing commercial activity, the Sudanese economy experienced notable advances. But whenever the captain or driver was unable to perform his duties, the trade locomotive became unstable and veered off course, causing serious damage to the Sudanese economy. To understand what became of trade as a result of that derailment, let us look back and examine what the Ministry was like — and what happened to it afterward.

The Ministry once managed both exports and imports according to carefully planned and considered policies. It was responsible for developing and promoting exports. It formulated policies and regulations aimed at promoting national products, enhancing their competitiveness and, consequently, increasing export volumes in order to maximize export revenues. To achieve these objectives, the Ministry had a number of institutions with extensive accumulated expertise in exports, serving as its mechanisms for managing foreign trade.

Among these institutions was the Public Corporation for Cotton Trade, which was responsible for regulating the cotton market, marketing production and setting the official procurement price to protect producers. It also provided production inputs.

There was also the Arab Gum Company, responsible for regulating the production and marketing of gum arabic with the aim of maximizing its returns, protecting producers, and developing the sector.

In the field of oilseeds, there was the Sudan Oilseeds Company, the countrys principal oilseed exporter. It served as the Ministrys mechanism for regulating the oilseed market, developing the sector and protecting producers.

In addition, there was the Public Corporation for Livestock and Meat Marketing, responsible for developing Sudans livestock and meat sector and providing the services it required, including drinking water and road security. Its principal role was to market Sudanese livestock and regulate its external market.

As for imports, the Ministry planned imports in a manner that served the states overall objectives. It consciously determined what should enter the country, in what quantities, by what means and at what time. This was because the importation of certain goods was prohibited during periods when those goods were being produced domestically. Import policy was therefore designed to serve the countrys economic objectives.

To carry out these responsibilities, the Ministry had a number of institutions operating in the field of imports, intended to break the private sectors monopoly by providing an alternative market for consumer goods. These included Al-Jazira Trading and Services Company, COPTRADE, Khartoum Company, and Kordofan Engineering Company, as well as Red Sea Company.

Alongside these companies, the Ministry also administered the cooperative sector, one of the countrys most important sectors. It included grassroots cooperative societies as well as local and national federations. The sector also owned a number of institutions engaged in importing and distributing goods, in addition to a long-established cooperative banking institution that financed the activities of the cooperative sector.

Through these institutions and mechanisms, the Ministry carried out its responsibilities. Peoples livelihoods and the health and safety of consumers were not merely slogans to be raised; they were among the Ministrys most important concerns and responsibilities toward the nation and its citizens.

The Ministry was responsible for ensuring the availability of consumer goods and regulating prices in the public interest. Its Quality Control Department, one of the Ministrys components, served as a vigilant guardian of quality and public health.

Economic stability and citizens welfare were not achieved through wishes or empty promises. They were achieved through a sense of responsibility, sustained hard work, sound planning and rational decision-making.

That was the Ministry of Trade in its early days and during its golden era, when trade was a source of prosperity and a path toward a better and more comfortable life. The economy continued to grow, production flourished, life prospered, and producers enjoyed the fruits of their labor.

That was why the Sudanese pound — an indicator of the strength or weakness of the economy — stood tall, broad-shouldered, clean-shaven and sporting a magnificent moustache, with a commanding presence and a powerful voice, never bent or stooped. It would squat down to embrace the dollar. And the dollar, standing tall on its own feet, could barely pat the Sudanese pound on the shoulder!

So, what happened afterward?!
The Bitter Reality

What happened to the Sudanese economy was a devastating earthquake followed by a massive volcanic eruption. As earthquakes typically do, it left cracks, fractures and deep fissures in its wake, while the volcano spewed scorching lava. The earthquake left deep scars in the structure of the Sudanese economy, scars that remained with it like permanent disabilities.

To prepare people psychologically to overcome the shock of the earthquake, some soothing terminology was deemed necessary, and it was called “economic liberalization.” This was accompanied by a number of cosmetic surgeries intended to remove the tumors and rashes that had appeared on the body of the economy. A Social Solidarity Fund was established, along with some painkillers intended to ease the impact of the fires ignited by the volcano of liberalization.

Thus, the policy of economic liberalization — the code name for that earthquake — came like a devastating earthquake that shook the foundations of the economic structure and a raging volcano that disfigured every component of society.

The economic liberalization policy announced in February 1992 was not merely a set of failed economic policies or ill-advised administrative decisions — had that been the case, the matter would have been easier to remedy. Rather, these policies were a campaign of retaliation aimed at dismantling and destroying everything distinctive and disfiguring everything that was beautiful.

The destruction reached the Ministrys institutions one after another. The Public Corporation for Livestock and Meat Marketing was dissolved, along with COPTRADE and Al-Jazira Trading and Services Company. Meanwhile, the capacities of the Sudan Oilseeds Company, the Arab Gum Company, the Public Corporation for Cotton Trade, Red Sea Company, Khartoum Company and Kordofan Engineering Company were crippled. These companies were reduced to little more than decaying shells.

What happened to the cooperative movement, however, was even more painful and devastating. The impact of liberalization on the cooperative sector was like a massive fire that wiped out all the achievements of Sudans cooperative movement. All the institutions of the cooperative movement were dissolved in a catastrophe resembling a massacre.

These were the consequences of economic liberalization for the Ministrys institutions, paving the way for the dominance of the private sector over the national economy and the squandering of the countrys wealth.

In short, the economic and social misery we are experiencing today is neither a coincidence nor a crime committed by an unknown perpetrator. Rather, it is the bitter fruit of the seeds planted by the ill-fated policy of economic liberalization.

The liberalization earthquake struck the firmly established economic structures, causing them to collapse and crumble. With the withdrawal of the Sudan Oilseeds Company, the countrys principal oilseed exporter, oilseed producers were left at the mercy of the private sector, which had a long record of exploiting producers and manipulating prices, leaving producers as the victims.

Sudan also lost most of its foreign markets as a result of the absence of direction and regulation. The same scenario was repeated with gum arabic. Once the Arab Gum Company withdrew from the gum market — after having been responsible for regulating the trade in gum arabic in Sudan — gum producers became subject to the same exploitation.

With its departure, Sudan lost control over the production and marketing of gum arabic, allowing smuggling and other harmful practices to spread.

The Public Corporation for Cotton Trade also disappeared after playing a major role in the sector. With its departure, the country lost control over cotton production and marketing, prices collapsed, and production and producers suffered as a result. The situation deteriorated to the point where cotton producers were forced to plead with the government to purchase their cotton, amid the complete absence of the Ministry of Finance.

The country likewise lost the Public Corporation for Livestock and Meat Marketing, which was dissolved at the same time the liberalization policy was announced. With its dissolution, we became unable to provide the essential services required for livestock and meat exports, and we lost a unified professional vision for international marketing.

Our traditional markets subsequently collapsed, and the country lost enormous foreign-exchange resources.

Thus, the Ministrys institutions deteriorated after having played such a major role in the national economy.

Since the Ministry of Trade was at the epicenter of the earthquake, the wrecking blows fell directly upon the Ministry itself, destroying its capacity for planning and regulation. Its role as an active institution in economic activity was sidelined, leaving it weakened and debilitated until it became little more than an empty shell. It effectively entered a state of coma, to the point where it no longer knew what was happening beyond its doors.

It did not know what imports were entering the country or how they were entering, nor what exports were leaving the country or how they were leaving.

Thus, we lost the capable captain of the ship and driver of the locomotive. The ship veered off course, the locomotives journey became chaotic, our wealth was squandered and our resources were left open to exploitation, until our national resources became “an inheritance with no known heir.”

At that point, smuggling was no longer an aberrant or socially condemned practice. It became the official activity — whether through the smuggling of cash and goods across the borders or the diversion of export proceeds outside the country.

As a result, our trade balance shrank until it became a laughing stock and a stark example of mismanagement.

Here I am referring to our foreign-exchange-earning agricultural and livestock exports, not Sudanese gold, which is another story — one that breaks the heart, stirs sorrow and brings old wounds painfully back to life.

One of the saddest paradoxes in Sudan is that we revisit our past experiences of failure, not with the intention of drawing lessons and correcting our course or avoiding the mistakes of the past, but in order to reproduce those failed experiences and deepen the tragedy!

What is happening in the mining sector today is an extension of an earlier painful experience in oil production.

We heard about oil in Sudan much as we hear the stories told by grandmothers in traditional Sudanese folktales, along the lines of:

“Once upon a time, long ago, there was oil in Sudan. Then the zarzur bird snatched it away, flew off, and landed somewhere beyond the Seven Seas.”

And so the story of oil in Sudan ended in the realm of the unknown — with the story of the zarzur flying away and disappearing beyond the Seven Seas.

The Longing for Reform

The oil project in Sudan began and continued until the curtain finally came down on it, while the Ministry of Trade remained unaware of the story from beginning to end. It did not know how much oil we produced, how much we exported, how much revenue those exports generated, or how the proceeds were spent, until the chapter on Sudanese oil was closed like the pages of a mysterious detective novel.

And yet everything that happened fell squarely within the Ministrys core responsibilities.

What is even more painful is that the tragedy did not end there. Here we are, summoning that painful experience of failure and recycling and expanding it into an even more appalling experience: the production of gold.

What is happening in the mining sector today is not really mining or exploration. It is a “raid” on the countrys precious resources. No responsible state treats its wealth as we do, and no respectable state would allow such a low level of reckless mismanagement.

Mineral resources are finite and non-renewable. They belong to all generations, present and future. It is therefore irresponsible to squander these resources with such reckless disregard, and unwise to exploit them with such imprudence.

So I will not talk about gold. Instead, consider these figures:

According to official government statistics, annual gold production reached its peak in 2017, when production was estimated at 107 tonnes, while official exports that year amounted to 34 tonnes, leaving a gap of approximately 70 tonnes. Specialists, however, estimate that actual annual production is as high as 240 tonnes.

That is the Ministry of Trade in its decline — and the bitter reality.

The Longing for Reform

As a result of the destruction and dismantling that have afflicted our economic institutions, and in light of the severity of the tragedy and misery the country is experiencing today, voices calling for reform are growing louder.

Under such circumstances, reform becomes an urgent necessity.

But before we set out on the road to reform, let us first feel the ground beneath our feet and examine our steps, so that we can be certain of the sincerity of our desire for reform itself.

Do we truly have the desire and the genuine will to reform? Do we really want to support the process of reform? Are we prepared to bear the consequences of reform, even when they conflict with our own interests?

And if that is the case, do we agree on a clear definition of corruption and on what reform actually means, so that we do not lose our way in the maze of interpretations offered by competing legal “schools” and intellectual “traditions” that have yet to agree on what corruption means in these troubled times?

The evidence weakens our confidence in that desire, and past experiences offer their own lessons.

At one point in the past, we were tasked with drafting a foreign trade policy in the form of regulations governing the movement of exports and imports. That assignment came in implementation of directives issued at the highest level.

As you know, exports and imports are the pillars of the economy.

Guided by those noble objectives, we began drafting regulations for exports and imports. Our aim was to protect our exports from waste and to rationalize imports in a way that served the national interest and protected the citizen.

To achieve those objectives, we prepared regulations containing numerous professional, technical and health requirements designed to ensure the soundness of commercial activity and protect both the country and its citizens.

We prepared those regulations in the hope that they would be implemented immediately, fully confident that they represented the first step on the road to reform.

But do you know where those regulations are now?

Do those concerned remember the successive directives and repeated instructions urging us to accelerate the reform project? Do they remember how we worked day and night, and night and day, to complete those regulations and produce them in a form that would benefit our country and our people?

Do they even remember that there was once a call for reform?

Why, then, did you bury it when you knew what it was?

Was that call for reform at the time a deeply held conviction, or was it merely a passing impulse?

Did you grow weary of reform, or was I alone singing outside the flock?

Is it not astonishing that, after all that effort, the regulations should simply be thrown into the wastebasket and consigned to oblivion?

As for the corruption file, the story is even more astonishing.

In response to even stronger and more uncompromising directives from the highest authorities to fight corruption, we began tracing the footprints of corruption and searching through the lairs of those involved in corrupt practices.

We prepared files overflowing with evidence and documentation.

At the time, we were not driven by a desire for revenge, nor were we pursuing any individual for personal reasons. We were motivated by duty, responsibility and the obligation we owed to our country.

We submitted those files, supported by evidence, to facilitate the course of justice.

But do you know what happened afterward?!

Forget for a moment what happened.

Do you know that those files, which are now more than two years old, are still locked away in drawers?

Did we misunderstand the situation? Did we misjudge things and fail to identify corruption where it actually existed?

If that is the case, then, for Gods sake, tell us:

What kind of corruption were you talking about?

Reform — How?

In conclusion, I do not wish to discuss the options for escaping this painful reality. That is what we intend to address in a forthcoming publication entitled “The Road to Salvation.”

What we do wish to emphasize here is that the situation we are living through today can only be remedied by returning to what once made things work in the first place: restoring the cooperative movement to its former glory and reviving the path from which it was cut short.

By this I mean both productive and consumer cooperatives.

Productive cooperation is the lifeboat and the means of reaching safe shores.

Another path to salvation is to empower producers to benefit from what they produce, after agricultural production has been turned into a form of forced labor, with brokers and moneylenders speculating on the efforts and sweat of impoverished producers.

We have reached the point where we have become a country that punishes producers for producing, while rewarding brokers and moneylenders for profiting from their hardship.

Yet empowering producers cannot be achieved without a return to cooperation.

Therefore, under the difficult circumstances we are experiencing, cooperation is no longer merely an option or one alternative among many. It has become an inescapable necessity and a safeguard against collapse.

“People remain well as long as they cooperate.”

That is the teaching of our Noble Messenger.

And it is not beyond our reach.

We also believe that any reform project aimed at addressing our troubled reality must begin with the Ministry of Trade.

The Ministry of Trade is the source from which people draw when it is sound, and the vessel from which demons emerge when it is corrupt.

Despite the obvious weakness that has afflicted it as a result of the onslaught of thieves, seeking ways out of this painful predicament and searching for solutions anywhere other than the Ministry of Trade would only mean persisting in confusion and going further astray.

Have I delivered the message? O God, bear witness.