A-Z Updates

Karen Hofman, University of the Witwatersrand and Charles Parry, South African Medical Research Council

The alcohol industry is doing exactly what the tobacco industry did several decades ago to ensure growth and increase profits: expanding into Africa as an underdeveloped market. As a result, exposure to alcohol in African countries is expected to increase in the next few years. With it comes alcohol-related health and social problems.

Strategy hints coming out of the US$ 103 billion merger between SAB Miller and AB InBev provide a good reference point. The merged entity’s strategy clearly shows that Africa will be a critical driver for growth. Competitors like Pernod Ricard and Diageo are not far behind.

The alcohol industry is under pressure and needs to develop new sources of growth and profits. Markets in the developed world are under threat as a result of saturation. This is coupled with the fact that only a limited numbers of new drinkers are entering the market each year due to low population growth rates.

The expansion into developing economies comes as warnings about the harm that alcohol causes are gaining traction. As a result several countries have revised their guidelines on alcohol consumption. In the UK for example, there’s a move to regulate the sale and marketing of alcoholic drinks. And in Scotland a minimum price for alcohol is about to be introduced.

As a result the alcohol industry is targeting less regulated but more affluent low and middle income countries. Africa is becoming a key focus.

Studies show this is bad news for the continent. Alcohol is a risk factor for non-communicable diseases such as liver cirrhosis, heart disease and a range of common cancers of the breast, throat and mouth. Alcohol also interacts with other health challenges such as HIV, road traffic accidents, violence – including domestic violence – and mental health.

Sub-Saharan Africa provides particularly fertile ground for growing market share due to the high proportion of the population in many countries who don’t yet consume alcohol (especially among females), the high youth population in most countries, and the growth in GDP in certain countries. Low advertising costs, weak regulation, high-intensity consumption of beer in these markets make for an ideal environment for global brands.

The dangers of alcohol are well documented. Across the globe, more than 3.3 million people die from harmful use of alcohol each year. More than 20% of deaths from liver cirrhosis, certain cancers of the mouth and throat, interpersonal violence and self-harm are due to alcohol use.

Alcohol is responsible for more than 7% of all deaths globally and it was the 9th leading risk factor for death and disability globally in 2015, up from tenth place in 2005 and eleventh in 1990. In the southern sub-Saharan Africa region alcohol ranked fifth as a risk factor for death and disability. With rising alcohol exposure, the extent to which alcohol contributes to various negative health outcomes are expected to also increase.

The global alcohol industry’s new focus in low and middle income countries mirrors the moves made by big tobacco companies in penetrating these markets.

Transnational tobacco corporations have succeeded in driving up smoking in African markets through aggressive marketing strategies. Their strategy included disguising marketing as corporate social responsibility programmes.

Alcohol firms are using the same strategy. Under the guise of corporate social responsibility they have run campaigns to promote “responsible” and “moderate” drinking.

Alcohol companies also position themselves as being committed to promoting the consumption of lower alcohol products. For example AB InBev’s campaign, called Global Smart Drinking Goals, states that its objective is to:

This may appear to be a positive message, but research on similar strategies suggests otherwise. It indicates that this is unlikely to be about substituting regular beer products for lower alcohol beverages. Rather the aim is to increase the overall size of the beer market through an expanded range of products.

Alcohol companies have also developed low-cost, entry-level products aimed at attracting new consumers, citing the greater safety of commercially produced products over homebrews.

An example is the introduction of commercially manufactured ‘Chibuku Shake Shake’ beer by SABMiller in Zambia. It’s based on a locally brewed traditional sorghum beer but is marketed as offering more consistent quality and safer than the home-brew variant.

The promotion of brewers products as safer alternatives forms part of a wider corporate social responsibility agenda aimed at highlighting the positive social impact that companies are having. A good example is Diageo’s water sanitation project.

Another strategy used successfully by tobacco companies as well as alcohol companies is government partnerships.

These have become an effective avenue through which the industry influences and limits regulation. For example, national alcohol policy documents from four sub-Saharan countries (Lesotho, Botswana, Malawi and Uganda) have been found to be identical and reflecting the alcohol industry’s preferred policy wording.

As the global alcohol industry moves to expand across the continent, more research, policy and public attention needs to be paid to industry practices and governance mechanisms to help understand and prevent the negative impact this will have on the population’s health. Industry expansion into African markets will be sold as being progressive, as providing new jobs, access to safer and healthier alcohol products. Perhaps nearer to the truth would be to describe this as David Jernigan, the leading health academic who has analysed the impact of alcohol and its marketing did, labelling it “Thirsting for Markets” and as possibly even as part of the recolonisation of Africa.

Karen Hofman, Program Director, PRICELESS SA, Wits/MRC Agincourt Rural Health Transitions Unit, University of the Witwatersrand and Charles Parry, Director of the Alcohol, Tobacco & Oher Drug Research Unit, South African Medical Research Council

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

David Mickler, University of Western Australia

Nigeria and its neighbours have proposed a regional taskforce to tackle the brutal Boko Haram insurgency, which has waged war in the northeast of the country since 2009. But will it work?

Boko Haram has killed more than 10,000 people and forced more than a million others to flee. It has captured 30,000 square kilometres of Nigerian territory, has reported links to al-Qaeda and has been dubbed “Africa’s ISIS”.

So, where has the plan for a regional taskforce come from? What does it propose to do? And will it have UN Security Council authorisation?

Nigeria is home to Africa’s largest economy and its largest population. It is also Africa’s largest democracy, albeit a fragile one. But Nigeria has faced an increasingly brazen campaign of violence and terror by Boko Haram.

Attacks occur almost daily on both government and civilian targets, and recent events have raised the stakes. In April 2014, Boko Haram sparked international outrage by kidnapping nearly 300 schoolgirls from Chibok. In January this year, ten-year-old suicide bombers were reportedly used in attacks and militants decimated the people and town of Baga.

Boko Haram has also expanded its attacks into Cameroon, Niger and now Chad. This has made stopping it more than just a Nigerian problem.

The Nigerian government, a leader in African peace and security governance, has been unable to counter this violent challenge. Declaring a state of emergency in three northeastern states, it has deployed under-resourced Nigerian army forces and been accused of extra-judicial killings of suspected insurgents. Its failure to halt attacks has been a source of frustration and criticism.

The crisis even threatens Nigerian democracy. National elections due to have been held on February 14 were postponed for six weeks. The government claims this is due to an inability to securely conduct the poll in the affected states.

The Nigerian government has used its regional power and influence to control how Boko Haram features on African and international security agendas. However, it has reluctantly come to accept that it needs external help.

As the Boko Haram insurgency has spread, Nigeria’s neighbours have sought to co-operate to halt its progress. In mid-2014, the search for a regional solution gathered momentum. Representatives from Nigeria and its neighbours in the Lake Chad Basin Commission (LCBC), Chad, Cameroon and Niger, met with counterparts from Benin, France, the US and UK.

Following the Chibok abductions, in May 2014 the UN Security Council added Boko Haram to its list of terrorist groups under travel, financial and weapons sanctions.

In October 2014, the LCBC agreed on a plan to deploy a Multinational Joint Task Force to counter Boko Haram. Under the terms of regional and global security governance concerning the legitimate use of military force, the proposal needed formal authorisation by the African Union and the UN Security Council.

In January, the African Union formally authorised the taskforce for an initial 12-month period. It has called on the Security Council to do the same, and to provide financial and logistical support.

Most recently, the LCBC and partners met in Cameroon in February to hammer out the final operational details.

The taskforce would consist of 8700 military, police and civilian personnel. It would conduct co-ordinated military and intelligence operations to prevent Boko Haram’s expansion and to stabilise areas previously under its control. It would also protect civilians, help displaced people to return home and enable some humanitarian assistance.

However, the extent to which neighbouring countries would actually be allowed to operate their forces on Nigerian soil is not clear.

Nigeria’s role in the development of a regional approach has been and remains crucial. As a member of both the African Union Peace and Security Council and the UN Security Council, Nigeria has slowly allowed the issue of Boko Haram onto their agendas – but it has largely directed the international response.

The UN Security Council will now consider the taskforce proposal. This will include sorting out who will pay for the taskforce and logistical issues.

The Security Council will also consider how human rights would be protected in any UN-authorised counter-insurgency campaign against Boko Haram. Many observers have criticised the Nigerian government’s human rights record during the response so far, and the impunity with which abuses have been committed.

The Nigerian government is gearing up for a major operation against the insurgents and claims it can defeat them within the six weeks before the delayed election. The immediate tasks are to contain Boko Haram from spreading into the wider region, and then to begin making inroads into the significant territory under its control to protect vulnerable civilian populations.

There are deeper issues regarding the conditions that have enabled Boko Haram to flourish, which are beyond the mandate and capacity of any regional intervention force. These include political marginalisation and socio-economic underdevelopment in the predominantly Muslim regions of Nigeria’s north, religious radicalisation and wider governance challenges, such as corruption, in the Nigerian polity.

These are issues for the Nigerian people and their governments to address, starting with the rescheduled national elections on March 28.

David Mickler, Lecturer in Foreign Policy and International Relations, University of Western Australia

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.