The Namibian Retail Sector Charter was signed on March 11, 2016 as a voluntary tool to help transform the retail sector from one that relies primarily on imports to one that prioritizes locally manufactured products by promoting local sourcing by retailers.
Encapsulated in the charter, the objective was to focus, initially, on three industries, namely: hardware, fast moving goods and consumables as well as clothing and textiles.
After its inception and signing, the Namibia Trade Forum embarked on the crucial work of understanding the retail and distribution sector by seeking to unpack the bottlenecks to market access in sector as a way to facilitate interventions. Additionally, a scorecard was created to measure retailer performance.
However, according to Stacey Pinto, CEO of the Namibia Trade Forum, the main challenge in implementing the Retail Sector Charter in Namibia is to vary the types and models of business – and therefore for each , there are different supply models.
“It requires specific technical capacity to work with such varied institutions to explore the transition process of buying more local products. The other challenge is simply the availability of various goods in the market. In order to increase local sourcing, there should be market availability of these products – and this is an area we are still trying to address as a country. Last but not least, the area of standards (quality) is one that we continue to help address with institutions such as the NSi (Namibia Standards Institute) to try to ensure that our products reach the standards necessary for consumers – at the both locally and internationally,” Pinto said in response to questions from New era.
Pinto added that the Namibian Retail Sector Charter has come a long way since its inception.
“We look forward to onboarding more sectors, institutions and retailers over the coming year as we truly believe in the impact this will create, especially at the MSME level. We look forward to a Namibia that is food enough (as far as it can and that is competitively viable) as well as to see a retail sector that absorbs as much quality local produce as possible – and, in turn, will help create jobs and grow our economy,” Pinto said.
So far, more than 15 companies in the three key sectors have signed the charter. But, as the charter is currently a voluntary tool, it is not mandatory for all outlets to sign up – but they are encouraged to do so to support the goals of the charter.
Pinto explained that the reasons for the voluntary nature of the charter center on the fact that not all companies are the same – and as such have different value chain models, which in most cases, are not easy to change and take time to transition. as required by the charter.
Says Pinto: “That’s why the charter was first introduced as a voluntary tool to allow this kind of transition to happen. It was also to allow our production capacity to improve and reach adequate standards. Thus, to companies that have not yet joined, we continue to offer a support function in their approach to integrating local sourcing into their models”.
The CEO of NTF continued that in terms of success, great strides have been seen in local sourcing in the horticulture and fresh produce sectors which has resulted in more jobs being created at the of production and distribution.
“We have also noted an increase in local sourcing of self-care products, food and beverages. We are currently reviewing the monitoring mechanism to ensure that we can gather real-time information on the number of local products in the market. It is also important to note that the Success Charter measurement is not only based on the number of local products on the shelves, but also on the work we do to help create a supportive retail environment that incorporates more locally produced products,” Pinto said. declared.
Key milestones according to the objectives of the Trade Sector Charter:
Buy Local Grow Namibia Campaign: This campaign was launched in October 2020 by Trade Minister Lucia Iipumbu and her partners. It was designed to help create the culture of buy local first to grow the local economy, in particular to help drive economic recovery from the onslaught of Covid-19.
Since the launch of the campaign and the subsequent launch of Phase II in Rundu by Vice President Nangolo Mbumba, there has been an increase in locally sourced products on the shelves, with some retailers reporting an average of 80 % of local purchases, in particular for horticultural products. . Phase II of the campaign aims to help build the capacity of local producers by helping them understand market entry requirements such as standards (quality), packaging, barcodes, etc.
For Phase II of the campaign, the NTF has partnered with the Namibia Standards Institute, Namibia Agronomic Board, Development Bank of Namibia, NIPDB, GS1 Namibia and retailers to support local growers along the way access to local retail space.
GS1 Namibia: A barcode is one of the most crucial things to have in place before you can enter the market, regardless of the importance of standards, packaging, etc. Thanks to the benchmarking work of the Retail Charter, the Namibia Barcode Center has been set up. The center is now known as GS1 Namibia; it administers a Namibian prefixed barcode.
This is long overdue work that will go a long way in the journey but also ensure the traceability of our products in the global marketplace.
E-Commerce Assessment in Namibia: The Namibia Trade Forum, with the support of EU Rise, an EU-funded facility, recently launched an E-Commerce Readiness Assessment for Namibia to help explore this market access option for local products. The outcome of this assessment will give us an indication of how well we are doing as a country on e-commerce and what kind of interventions need to be made to help establish e-commerce as an alternative market option for local producers.
