CDC- Heartbeat Of Cameroon’s Economy

By Ernest Ndukong

Economies are rated based on the living standards and living costs of her citizens, which is a function of the per capita income of that economy.

Indices used to rank economies are; growth and development. Unemployment, literacy, infrastructure, health care, social amenities; are some parameters used in ascertaining the wellbeing of citizens of an economy.

Economic development implies changes in income, savings and investment, along with progressive changes in the socio-economic structure of country; while economic growth refers to an increase in the real output of goods and services in the country.

The Cameroon Development Corporation (CDC), being an agro-industrial entity, contributes enormously to the growth and development of the communities in which its estates and units are located, in particular, and to Cameroon, in general, and the rest of the world.

Employment

The CDC can boast of being the second largest employer, after the State of Cameroon, with a work force of over 21,000 employees; thus hundreds of thousand others depend on these privileged hands for livelihood.

This economically empowered population forms an enviable market for goods and services produced by other companies who rely on the revenue to pay their workers.

Financial service producers offer financial services of diverse forms to these sparingly worthwhile Cameroonians. Banks sell their products which range from salaries and saving accounts, through granting loans to discounting personal cheques for service fees thereby generating revenue from CDC spillovers.

Market

Credit Unions have increased remarkably around the CDC environment. This has directly created jobs for hundreds of workers and empowered them financially leading to higher standards of living. For instance, the population of Nigeria is a formidable strength to that economy, likewise; the populated nature of the CDC forms a first-hand market for every product, especially products tied between levels 1 and 3 of Maslow’s need hierarchy.

Talking about a market, the corporation is a huge market for inputs like fertilisers, fuel, movable and immovable equipment of all sorts - and the list is in-exhaustive.  Some companies make annual turnovers of billions of francs CFA from supplies just to CDC. How about fuel consumption of over 120 million FCFA a month or spare parts and other materials imported from overseas - a veritable market indeed.

Balance of Payment/Trade

The business of CDC helps in giving the Cameroonian economy a positive balance of payment and trade on the foreign exchange platform. Her business repatriates home more than three scores of billions of francs annually. This puts our economy in a rational position to benefit from the advantages of foreign trade. CDC’s reputable involvement in foreign trade has built some unvalued goodwill for the country, that even her citizens resident overseas, enjoy some unmeasurable degree of freedom and friendliness.

Feeding the Nation

Two of CDC’s three main products are exported and palm oil and its bi-products are consumed locally. Every household uses cooking oil on a daily basis for preparing food. The bi-products of palm oil are used in feeding and growing animals and in the production of soap and kernel oil is also used medicinally. What is sold to the industries is added some value to end up as vegetable oil which the nation consumes. The average Cameroonian family consumes sub-standard banana.

Social Amenities

This agro-industrial complex created in 1947 provides electricity to some of its remote areas where ENEO has not yet had installations. One does not need to over-emphasise the importance of light as even God affirmed how pleasing it is, during the creation of the world.

The Corporation has embraced the near obligation to disenclave parts of our beloved fatherland by opening roads and constructing bridges. Its social clubs are at the service of the nation. Recreational facilities like swimming pools, tennis courts, football pitches, to name a few, have been made available to the over 21,000 workers and hundreds of thousands within the environs of CDC.

As a respecter of corporate social responsibility, the CDC provides health care to her workers and their immediate dependents. Worthy of note is the fact that the medical population of the CDC is above 50,000 people. To ensure that this need is attained, the CDC has built and equipped hospitals, clinics, health posts to realise the dream of ‘a healthy workforce is a productive workforce’.

Bio-friendliness

CDC has green plants and green plants are not just important to the human environment, they form the basis for long-term health of environmental systems. Green plants remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and generate oxygen required for human and animal life. CDC trees reduce pollution, control erosion, constitute wildlife habitat, saves energy & enhanced human comfort. CDC trees purify the air we breathe, act as sound barrier to noise and cool temperatures.
An African proverb says thus ‘you should not hoard your money and die of hunger’.