MOGADISHU, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) — Chinese-made products are growing in popularity in markets throughout Somalia, particularly in Mogadishu’s main Bakara market, the largest in the whole of the horn of Africa nation.

Many business people at the Bakara market say they have office sand agents in China who coordinate their imports mainly through the United Arab Emirates, where smaller ships that can risk Somalia’s pirate-infested waters are available.

The popularity of Chinese products with traders is very visible in most Somali markets where almost all the construction materials, electronics, telecommunications equipment and textiles are imported from the east Asian economic giant.

Osman Haji, a trader in Bakara, says most of the products in the market and his shop are imported from China.

“Generally most of the products at this market are imported from China and in my shop here I have many of them including this shampoo, battery brand White Elephant, these flip-flops, these gums and also these plastic bags and these padlocks, are also imported from China” Osman told Xinhua.

Traders at the market say they sell mainly Chinese-made products of various kinds because that is just what their costumers want.

A toy trader in Bakara market says they like to sell what the people want and that is Chinese-made products.

“This toy helicopter is from China. There are also toy guns, toy mobiles, balloons. We sell Chinese made products because of their low price and good quality,” said the trader.

Abdi Sheikh Abdule, owner of Tawakal Electronics, the largest electronics seller in the market, says facilities provided to businesses in Somalia by the Chinese government makes it also easy for traders to import products from China.

“We import almost all our goods from China where I regularly travel. We import from China mainly because first there is good access to the country as we can get visas in the shortest possible time. Secondly, the price of the products are affordable for most people here. And thirdly, the quality of the Chinese products are, unlike before, very excellent,” Abdule said.

Somali government on Monday hailed its trade ties with China and invited Chinese companies to invest in the country once peace and security is established.

However, the Somali government acknowledges that the trade between the two countries is currently “one-way,” while Somalia, which has been through nearly two decades of chaos, exports practically nothing to China.

But Somalia says things could change once the war-torn country is stable and peaceful when the Somali business community would be able to export all the country’s produce, mainly fishery and agriculture products to China.

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Source: XINHUA

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