Upgrading your country
Monocle magazine's latest issue has a piece on how to improve your country for investors, tourists etc.
Below is an extract from the piece. Its interesting to see where Nigeria is in all this - given the ambition to be one of the top 20 countries in the world (not sure on what criteria, how and by when)..
"You’ve mastered the basics (a respectable ranking on various transparency indexes, good human rights record, healthy citizens, decent inward investment), but you’re still of a bit of a nowhere nation according to a recent global poll… What to do?
1. Develop an appealing national cuisine
2. Develop a wine, beer, spirits industry
3. Be recognised for being fair and just
4. Re-engineer the heavens (if you don’t have good weather, hire some good photographers)
5. A good brand travels (a well run, safe and iconic airline)
6. Behave yourself! (be polite and well mannered to foreigners)
7. Go easy on religion
8. Master infrastructure
9. Build brands people want
10. Invest in athletics"
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11 comments:
Its the point of view that to be anyone you have to offer something to European customers. There is something to that, but from this extract I can't quite tell if they're being facetious.
The way they say it its as if the first stage of development is to get on Tyler Brule's holiday destination list
on this list of euro-centric criteria? Nigeria... nul points
They should move towards eco-tourism,they'll have more success there. Forget about good transportation system, lets work with what we've got. Back to nature!
jollof rice, dodo and suya seem to appeal to most (non veggie) people. nigerian beer is excellent and has been successfully exported. the weather is good when it isn't pouring with rain. and what could be more iconic than virgin? 4/10
me thinks we can provide on 1 & 2. Everything else is in progress...
besides, are these tourists from countries that also offer this?
Funny thing, as I read this I thought of Dubai (Ok Dubai is not a country but it applies very much so here).
- They treat foreigners well. Everyone is welcome (Except citizens of Israel, but that's another story).
- Infrastructure is world class. This need no explanation. Use Google images to search for Dubai.
- They have re-engineered the heavens. I mean they have a freaking indoor snow mountain in the middle of the desert.
- Their airline, Emirates is one of the best in the world. And they keep advertising it aggresively.
hmmm...lets hope Nigeria can at least draw near to one of the top countries...
There's a possibility, if the people can only try...
"Be recognized for being fair and just" (we've got a long way to go in this one...lol)
"Hire some good photographers" (good idea because I don't fancy the weather)
"Behave yourself" (Amen to a stop in breaking cues, rushing for molues, and all those other irrational behaviors)
As Cat said, based on this, we have a decent shot at 1 and 2. Everything else is gonna take some work.
i suppose if we sprinkle some parsel on Egusi or spruce up pounded yam with mint sprigs, we'd be well on our way :)
Who cares about world ranking when there is still no regular power supply? Surely Nigerians must start from clean water--the most basic need-- for all before rushing into good cuisine.
By the way, the Nigerian cuisine is AWESOME. YUM!
A lot of foreigners in Nigeria because of the culture of respect, tend to treat the indigenes with a total lack of respect and disdain, so I say Nigerians should totally ignore "politeness to foreigners" and insist on "rudeness as often as needed" instead. Many times rudeness is needed especially to indian, chinese and british (sorry) visitors.
Nigeria, has not mastered the basics by any stretch of the imagination. Once they can get to grips with that, maybe they can start to think about moving to join the top 20 nations, until then it's just pie in the sky.
agree with pbg, foreigners here can be incredibly rude to local staff, waiters etc. i witnessed one incident at a restaurant in vi, lagos. it was shocking the way this south african guy berated the waiter. one english couple i know treat their domestic staff like a subhuman species.
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