In August, more than 15 million West Africans will be in a very critical food situation, warns Laurent Bossard, director of the Sahel and West Africa Club at the OECD.

The Sahel and West Africa Club, created under the leadership of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) studies and supports the development of the eleven ECOWAS countries, Mauritania and Chad ( 450 million inhabitants).

At a time when Covid-19 has infected 49 African countries and killed more than 200 people on the continent, Laurent Bossard, director of the Club, is asking that a small part of the huge rescue packages announced in developed countries be devoted to the Africa, threatened by a disaster scenario and where famine could explode.

Jeune Afrique: What should African governments do to overcome the economic crisis that will follow the epidemic?

Laurent Bossard: You have to distinguish between what they should and what they can do. They should try to save their big airlines, tourism, energy companies like the governments of rich countries do by putting them on hold while they shut down their activities. They should also be concerned about the 80% or 90% of their population who live informally and who get up in the morning to find something to eat. It will be complicated to set up social safety nets and financial compensation for these difficult-to-target populations.

Can they do it? No, they don't have the means, as the President of Benin, Patrice Talon, said very lucidly. They are fundamentally poor and do not have thousands of billions to intervene in their economies like the developed countries. We risk witnessing a cascade of bankruptcies of their large companies. As for the informal sector, which is a sponge, it will put itself in a survival position.

Isn't it time to loosen the financial rules that handicap Africa?

Relaxing the demands of international institutions will not be enough. The meager resources of African governments are in danger of collapsing, given the severity of the fall in their revenues from the export of their raw materials.

If we don't find a drug, if we don't mobilize billions to help them in this emergency phase, the world will think it is out of the woods when Africa is confined with extremely high mortality rates. In August, between 15 and 17 million people will find themselves in a very critical food situation in West Africa alone. Migration flows will explode. A disaster scenario is possible.

What are the parades?

The fight against a pandemic is dealt with at the global level and its economic consequences too. No one has an interest in letting Africa sink when it is the last market to be conquered. It is imperative that it be included among the beneficiaries of the financial “packages” decided by the developed countries. It must be integrated into all plans to restore the global economy.

For example, Europe has decided to mobilize 1,000 billion euros to counter its health and economic crisis. If it devoted 0.7% of this pharaonic sum, or 7 billion euros, to Africa, it would only be beginning to respect the promise made to the UN by its member states to bring their official development assistance to 0. .7% of gross national income.

This crisis should also be an opportunity to restart the diversification of African economies which are too dependent on the export of unprocessed raw materials. Why not design a system that would stabilize their export resources for ten years, in return for a multiplication of their activities and an enrichment in value of their products?