Cameroon is in talks with Rothschild & Co. to advise on a planned Eurobond sale in the first half of this year, Treasury officials said.

“The government is in negotiations with Rothschild to pilot the next Eurobond for Cameroon,” Department of Treasury Director Tela Samuel said by phone from the capital, Yaounde. A Rothschild spokesperson declined to comment when contacted.

The proceeds from the sale will be used to help repay $750 million of debt the government issued in 2015, Treasury Director-General Moh Sylvester said by phone on Friday. “The intention is to issue before June 30,” he said.

Cameroon’s planned sale comes as increased spending by the U.S. on economic stimulus is driving up global borrowing costs. It would follow offerings by Benin, Egypt, Ivory Coast and Ghana so far this year, while Kenya and Nigeria have announced plans for issues.

The debt sales are taking place as African nations seek funds to roll over debt and finance budgets strained by the coronavirus pandemic. Other countries, including Ethiopia, have opted to seek debt relief under a Group-of-20 initiative.

Yields on Cameroon’s 2015 bonds have almost halved after reaching a record high in April last year, and traded at 7.16% in London on Friday.

Culled from Bloomberg

He does not have the international prestige of Danpullo, Colin Mukete or Kate Fotso. And yet, Njong Eric Njong is the most prominent Anglophone entrepreneur in Cameroon today.

Three years ago, Célestin Tawamba, the boss of bosses, had already named 59-year-old Njong Eric Njong – who spares no effort nor smiles – among the 60 pioneers of Cameroon’s economy.

Tawamba even co-opted Njong and put his name forward during the last election of the executive board of the Groupement Interpatronal du Cameroun (Gicam), in December 2020.

National preference

At Gicam, Njong succeeded Franklin Ngoni Njie, head of the Cameroon Development Corporation (CDC), which is the country’s leading (public) agro-industrial group.

Like CDC, his company, Boh Plantations – founded 12 years ago – produces bananas. Established in the South-West (where Njong himself comes from), it remains a small player in a sector dominated by PHP (Compagnie Fruitière de Marseille), the latter giving it technical assistance. Contrary to what happened to CDC in 2018-2019, the security crisis has not forced Boh Plantations to cease its activities for the time being.

Njong’s compatriots know him best through Buns, the construction company that the Lagos University-educated architect set up in 1993 and which has merged with the firm he founded.

Buns is one of the few local players – along with André Siaka’s Routd’Af – that can still compete with the multinationals in this sector. This businessman, who is a champion of “national preference” within the construction industry, is not hostile to all foreign investors.

For example, he is still chair of the board following the merger between the Cameroonian insurance firm Zenithe and its Senegalese equivalent Sonam.

Immersed for a long time in the financial sector, he also chairs the board of directors of the Union Bank of Cameroon, an institution which – after years of difficulty – may finally see the end of the tunnel.

In February, the state promised to recapitalise the bank, following a decision by Cameroon’s President Paul Biya.

Culled from The Africa Report by Oke Akombi Ayukepi Akap in Glasgow

MTN Cameroon has announced a new brand campaign with the slogan “Unbeatable with MTN, the indomitable network”. It highlights coverage, speed and quality of a service covering more than 97 percent of the population via 2G, 3G+, 4G and 4.5G technologies.

Source: Telecompaper

Today (9 March 2021) the United Kingdom has signed an Economic Partnership Agreement with Cameroon.

The trade deal, which will support jobs and build future prosperity, was signed by International Trade Minister Ranil Jayawardena and High Commissioner of Cameroon to the UK, H.E. Albert Fotabong Njoteh in London. The deal provides certainty for British and Cameroonian businesses, ensuring they can continue to trade as freely as they do now without any additional barriers or tariffs.

The UK-Cameroon trade was worth around £200m in 2019, and this deal lays a foundation to extend our trading relationship in the future. The UK market accounts for 12% of total exports of bananas from Cameroon and this agreement will maintain tariff-free market access to the UK. It also guarantees continued market access for UK exporters, who sold £50m in goods to Cameroon in 2019.

International Trade Minister Ranil Jayawardena said:

Today’s deal secures opportunities for both British and Cameroonian businesses – and will help support jobs and foster investment.

International trade and investment are engines of economic growth around the globe, so today’s deal will play a crucial role as we all build back better from Covid-19.

Minister for Africa James Duddridge said:

This agreement will make sure around £200m of trade between the UK and Cameroon can continue, supporting Cameroonian businesses to increase operations, enabling UK exporters to sell more goods and boosting prosperity for both countries as we together recover from the Covid-19 pandemic.

This provides the continuity businesses in both the UK and Cameroon need to ensure trade between our countries continues to flourish and grow.

Today’s signing comes after the agreement to roll over current EU-Cameroon trading arrangements from 1 January 2021 concluded at the end of December.

The UK government has secured agreements covering 66 countries plus the EU, worth £890bn of trade in 2019.

Source: Gov.UK

The Chadian government, which is mired in debt and badly affected by the Covid-19 crisis, wants to speed up the sale of part of its shares in the COTCO oil pipeline to Cameroonian state-owned oil company SNH and President Biya and his ruling CPDM crime syndicate are poised to buy the Chadian oil pipeline stake as Idris Deby battles with economic crisis.

Source: Africa Intelligence

Cameroon could lose its access to the lucrative European Union seafood market due to the government’s failure to tackle illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing.

The European Commission has put Cameroon on notice by issuing the country a “yellow card,” which is a formal warning that could lead to a total ban on seafood exports from the country to the E.U.

Cameroon, the commission said, has so far failed to abide by agreed standards “under international law of the sea as flag, port, and market state.”

The commission identified a lack of a robust registration policy for fishing vessels to operate under its flag, and insufficient attempts to ensure efficient and adequate control over fishing activities carried out by vessels flying the country’s flag, key constraints in Cameroon’s involvement in the fight against IUU.

According to the Environmental Justice Foundation (EJF), Cameroon is notorious in offering a “flag of convenience” to fishing vessels operating illegally with minimal monitoring and enforcement hence facilitating illicit marine seafood harvest “by making it hard to identify and take action against boat owners.”

“We very much welcome the European Commission’s decision to warn and initiate a formal dialogue with Cameroon,” EJF Executive Director Steve Trent said.

Trent said illegal operators using Cameroon’s flag of convenience abetted illicit fishing that “undermine any attempts to manage fisheries sustainably and push fish populations to collapse, threatening food security and livelihoods in many regions.”

He commended the European Commission’s use of the carding system, which he said is a “powerful tool against flags of convenience and has helped several countries such as Togo, reform dramatically.”

The preference of Cameroon as the source of the flag of convenience has been linked to laxity in government, with EJF’s previous findings showing at least a third of vessels, now sailing under the country’s flag, were adopted “only recently, in the last two to three years, despite having no obvious link with the country.”

The country’s fishing capacity is now nine times larger than it was before 2018, according to the EJF.

“Sustained commitment to progress is needed from all countries if we are to succeed in ending illegal fishing and once again the European Union is leading the world in this commitment,” Trent said.

Previously, FAO had observed emergence of a small industrial fleet “consisting primarily of shrimp trawlers, which are however often operated in joint venture with distant fishing nations.”

Despite nearly 50 trawlers greater than 24 meters having been reported way back in 2009, FAO says there are no reliable recent figures reported.

By 2015, a total fleet of 12,700 vessels was reported with 4,000 unpowered and 7,200 powered vessels, all under 12 meters, according to the FAO. An estimated 239,000 metric tons (MT) of fish was caught at the time, with 75,000 MT from inland waters and 164,000 MT from marine waters. More than 65 percent of the total catch is small pelagics.

Source: Seafoodsource.com