Interview with Lantosoa Rakotomalala, Minister of Industry, Trade and Crafts, in charge of MICA, a sovereign tool for the strategic and sustainable transformation of Madagascar's economy.
How will Madagascar's Emergence Plan boost investment in the industrial sector?
Madagascar's industrialization is a key lever of the Madagascar Emergence Plan, whose objectives are to establish a business environment conducive to growth, investment, and employment, but also to strengthen the competitiveness of Malagasy companies and promote foreign direct investment. The department is focusing on a portfolio of programs: promoting regional industrialization based on the transformation potential specific to each district of the country through the ODOF or One District One Factory, supporting manufacturers in diversifying their activities, promoting industrial parks, and marketing agri-food and textile industrial zones. Local production of everyday consumer goods, representing a domestic market of more than 26 million consumers, thus tends to reduce imports of these goods. The Madagascar Emergence Plan's infrastructure programs, currently underway in the country, are helping to reduce industrial factor costs: road construction, logistics platform development, port and airport expansion, energy sector development, and large-scale agriculture.
Are you calmly considering your country's entry into the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA)?
Madagascar is one of the 54 African countries that signed the agreement launched in Kigali in 2018. Ratifying the agreement, which marks integration into this market of 1.3 billion consumers, requires preparation, both at the state and private sector levels. Supporting the diversification of our exports, further informing the private sector about the challenges and opportunities of integration, supporting the productive sector in its competitiveness both locally and internationally, and developing the service industry are the preparations that the ministry and the private sector are currently undertaking with a view to integration into the AfCFTA. Furthermore, the Madagascar Export Promotion Agency will be operational in the second half of 2021 to serve as a lever in promoting our exports.
What place do you give to craftsmanship and “made in Madagascar”?
The vision of crafts in Madagascar is focused in particular on artisan trades. Indeed, long considered as being only a producer of artisanal products, the paradigm shift is based on the consideration of the department as the largest provider of employment in Madagascar. Indeed, the census carried out by INSTAT or National Institute of Statistics counts a database of more than 489,000 artisans across the country in 2020, each artisan practices a trade employing an average of five people, grouped around 147 trades ranging from the profession of artisan pastry chef to the profession of creator of artisanal objects. The digitalization and formalization of the sector are the current projects with a view to providing more training, production tools and financing for those who create and develop micro, small and medium-sized enterprises around artisan trades in Madagascar. For handcrafted products made in Madagascar, the use of Madagascar raffia in major international fashion brands and the creativity of artisans continue to surprise the international market. A business incubator and a source of decent employment, the craft sector contributes to Madagascar's growth and development and effectively contributes to wealth creation. MICA therefore makes it a point of honor to increase opportunities for these entrepreneurs, associations, clusters, and cooperatives.