The Economics of Grain Warehousing in Sub-Saharan Africa

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Periodical article

Title:	The Economics of Grain Warehousing in Sub-Saharan Africa
Authors:	Coulter, Jonathan Sondhi, Jagdish Boxall, Robin
Year:	2000
Periodical:	African Review of Money, Finance and Banking - Supplement to 'Savings and Development'
Pages:	97-116
Language:	English
Geographic terms:	Ghana Zambia
Subjects:	storage maize Agriculture, Natural Resources and the Environment Development and Technology Economics and Trade
External link:	https://www.jstor.org/stable/23026284
Abstract:	Efficient 'public' and third party warehousing services potentially have an important role to play in enhancing the performance of agriculture in Africa. This paper reports on research into the economics of warehousing maize in Ghana and Zambia. It formulates general conclusions about the economics of warehousing in Africa and draws implications about the way in which such services may be best organized in the future. Due to underdeveloped links between trading and financial sectors, and to speculative risks, very high profits can currently be earned from intraseasonal storage of grains in Zambia and Ghana. Nonetheless, it is difficult to establish public warehousing services in grain production areas, because of the risk of low capacity utilization and high unit overheads. Such services can only be profitable if combined with other profitable activities, such as trading, collateral management, freight forwarding or brokerage. Bibliogr., notes, sum. in English and French.