Africa's continuing Commodity Trap

Africa Focus analyses the continents commodity trap:

"...most African countries have been losing market shares in commodity exports to other developing countries, while at the same time most have been unable to diversify into manufactured exports. Africa's difficulties in maintaining market shares for its traditional commodities derive from its inability to overcome structural constraints and modernize its agricultural sector, combined with the high cost of trading. Africa has not been able to increase the productivity of its agriculture because of a combination of factors, including land tenure and small-scale farming, rudimentary technology and policies that reduced the role of state institutions in innovation and investment in the sector. As a result, it has lost its competitive advantage in producing cocoa, tea and coffee vis-a-vis the new and more competitive producers in Asia and Latin America..."