Scraping a living from cotton

By Annie Caulfield
BBC News

The cotton industry in Burkina Faso struggles in the face of competition from wealthy countries whose cotton farmers are heavily subsidised. Annie Caulfield talked to the country's farmers and its president to find out the extent of the problem.

"They might be simple questions for you to ask but maybe answering them won't be so simple."

The World Trade Organisation has ruled that cotton subsidies are illegal

The well dressed official from the cotton company smiled at me. His colleagues in the office laughed, politely.

Staff from Sofitex, Burkina Faso's monopoly cotton producer, had been consistently polite. But so far they had evaded my simple questions about local problems in the industry.

Perhaps, it was now suggested, I should try the office down the corridor.

The man in this office was roaring at his secretary. He switched to an expansive smile when he heard I was a journalist and offered me a seat - "Tea, coffee..?"

No, sadly he wasn't the man to answer simple questions either. I needed to see the public relations officer back in the capital city, Ouagadougou, a five-hour drive away.

These farmers were encouraged to turn their fields over to cotton because impoverished Burkina Faso needed a cash crop

Out in the villages where the cotton workers scrape a living from the thin, dry soils, questions were much more readily answered.

"We have to buy all our seeds, fertilisers and pesticides from Sofitex.

And there is no one else to sell the crop to. They can say any price they like. They give a lower and lower price and it can take months to get paid - four or five months."

Burkina Faso depends on cotton for 60% of its gross domestic product.

Subsidies

Along with other African cotton producers - Benin, Chad and Mali - they've been to the World Trade Organisation asking for fair dealing, particularly from the USA.

African cotton producers challenged the multi-billion dollar subsidies received by US farmers

American cotton growers receive heavy subsidies, allowing them to flood the market with cheap cotton.

At West Africa's roadsides, posters demanding fair trade show people drowning in cotton. They're drowning in cotton and in debt.

Sofitex is a state-owned monopoly. They have been looking for investors to keep Burkina Faso's cotton industry afloat in the world market but, for the small farmers, the immediate enemy is Sofitex.

"They give us such a low price when we're in debt to them, we can't pay them back."

These farmers were encouraged to turn their fields over to cotton because impoverished Burkina Faso needed a cash crop.

Charities

The farmers have no other income. Their children rely on charities for schools and health dispensaries.

Did you ever meet a farmer who was happy with the world? President Blaise Compaore

I asked if they were aware that America was responsible for flooding the world with cheap cotton.

"It's Sofitex that takes months to pay us," a farmer shrugs.

The farmers would only speak to me in a group - this way no one could be singled out as troublemaker.

Unanimously they agreed that they lived as slaves to the cotton company.

The President of Burkina Faso himself, Blaise Compaore, was another person who met my questions about Sofitex with polite laughter.

He said: "Look, did you ever meet a farmer who was happy with the world?"

Helpless

To him the farmers just don't understand that Sofitex is helpless until wealthy countries stop pushing down cotton prices.

President Compaore was elected president in 1991

Admittedly, I have never heard British farmers saying, "No, everything's great" but you don't see sickly, hungry children in British villages.

You don't meet people with absolutely no safety net. If a farm in Britain collapses, the farmer's children can still get basic medical care, go to school and have food.

Rising debt and decreasing prices push Burkina Faso cotton farmers to complete destitution.

The president kept on dismissing the farmers as whingers, protesting that his hands were tied by international protective tariffs although, heroically, he was out in the world fighting for his cotton farmers.

Self-effacing

The president is having a new palace constructed and currently lives in the city of Ouagadougou.

Casual and self-effacing, Blaise Compaore isn't as scary as he's made out to be.

He came to power as the result of a bloody coup and there are rumours that he has helped rebels in Sierra Leone, Liberia and, more recently, the rebels in the Ivory Coast.

But Blaise Compaore is chipper and courteous and he repeatedly evades my questions about the cotton farmers' plight.

The farmers in Burkina Faso have a vague notion that subsidies given to American farmers may be causing their problems.

But the people they're afraid of are the debt collectors from Sofitex. They say there's no avoiding any debt to the company. It passes on to the family or to the whole the village.

So the simple question I had for the president - having been politely dismissed by Sofitex personnel - was why was the cotton company getting increased investment but not passing this on in subsidies to the farmers?

"It's not as simple as that," the president said. Then he began such a convoluted speech about unfair international trade relations that I was sorry I'd asked.

From Our Own Correspondent was broadcast on Saturday, 2 April, 2005 at 1130 GMT on BBC Radio 4. Please check the programme schedules for World Service transmission times.