Latest data from a UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) report shows Somalia exported 4.9 million goats and sheep, 295,000 cattle and 72,000 camels last year.

Livestock contributes 40 percent to the Somalia’s Gross Domestic Product, with its exports being the Horn of Africa nation’s leading foreign exchange earner.

The growth has been boosted by continued export-focused interventions, “good prices”, and growing markets in the Middle East, analysts say.

Saudi Arabia continued to be a key market for Somali livestock, according to Khalid Saeed, the head of FAO’s livestock sector in Somalia.

“Somalia saw increased demand in 2015 for live animals in the Gulf, mainly due to increased investment in animal health services by FAO and other organizations, which is key condition imposed by the importing countries,” Saeed said.

Over 2,600 Somali camels were sold to Egypt in 2015, the first time since civil conflict broke out in Somalia some 25 years ago, the report said.

Livestock in most parts of Somalia are sold by visual evaluation. Sheep or goats of local breeds weighing about 35 to 40 kg can be sold at an equivalent price of 50 dollars.

Borana breed cattle, with an average body weight of 300 kg, is sold at about 300 dollars, while camels weighing 300 kg are sold at about 700 dollars per head.

“Analysis of these average farm-gate prices indicates that Somali livestock producers could have earned more than 380 million dollars in 2015 from animal exports,” the report said.

The FAO last year increased its animal health-focused activities, including the vaccination of 12 million animals across Somalia against peste des petits ruminants — a highly contagious and often deadly viral disease of goats.

The vaccination of over 30 million animals over the last four years in Somalia has helped Somalia achieve herd immunity of 76 percent, the report said.

Somalia’s Minister of Livestock, Forestry and Range, Said Hussein Iid, said the government was pleased with the remarkable growth in livestock exports, adding that there is still much more to do to grow this sector.

“We need to diversity into new markets, make sure that livestock have good year round access to high quality fodder and continue to build a national system for managing animal health across the whole of Somalia,” he said.

Previous health concerns led to an economically-crippling nine-year export ban on Somali livestock in 2000.

Richard Trenchard, FAO’s Country Representative for Somalia, said the UN agency would continue to mobilize technical and financial resources to ensure that Somalia’s livestock sector regains its past glossy as a major player in the global livestock industry. Enditem

Source: Xinhua

Somalia’s growth may lag others in the region but the government will be encouraged by the mere fact that an annual IMF Article IV consultation has taken place, marking a step to rehabilitation, even if the team held discussions in Nairobi.
“Economic activity is estimated to have expanded by 3.7 percent in 2014, driven by growth in agriculture, construction and telecommunications,” the IMF said in a statement at the end of its June 8-18 mission.
“With modest progress on the security front and an absence of drought, medium-term annual growth should be about 5 percent. Nevertheless, growth will remain inadequate to redress poverty and gender disparities,” it said.

In February, the Merchants Bank of California closed down all accounts of Somali-American Money Transfer Operators due to the increasing difficulty of complying with federal money laundering and terrorism financing regulations. That action has created new hardships for thousands of families in Somalia already struggling to meet their basic needs.

The resolution adopted by the U.S. Conference of Mayors was sponsored by Mayor Ed Murray of Seattle and Mayor Betsy Hodges of Minneapolis. Minneapolis and Seattle are home to the largest and second-largest Somali immigrant communities in the United States.

“Like many immigrants, Somali-American families want to send financial support to their loved ones back home,” Murray said. “These refugees who have found a better life in the United States are doing what any of us would do for their family members. The federal government must find a path forward to allow these remittances to continue.”

“Minneapolis is proud to be home to such a large and vibrant Somali community,” said Minneapolis Mayor, Betsy Hodges. “Their ability to send money home provides loved ones in Somalia with a critical lifeline that we must protect. Cash in suitcases in not a solution. I’m strongly requesting that banks work with Somali money wiring agencies so that hard-working residents of Minneapolis can help support their families.”

More than two million people in Somalia are dependent on financial assistance overseas. Somalia receives approximately $1.3 billion in remittances each year. Funding from these accounts had provided for food, water, shelter and education. The effects of these account closures have been exacerbated due to Somali’s lack of a functioning commercial banking system.

“In Somalia, where only one out of every three people has access to safe drinking water, money transfers from the U.S. and around the world comprise the single largest sector of the country’s economy,” said Raymond C. Offenheiser, President of Oxfam America. “These funds help Somalis meet their most basic needs. The U.S. government must pay urgent attention to hard-working Somali-Americans who are struggling to support their loved ones.”

The U.S. Departments of State and Treasury have yet to develop a system that would help local banks meet regulatory standards and allow financial aid to keep making its way to Somalia, while still ensuring the security of the United States. Last month in Seattle, Mayor Murray met with Secretary of State John Kerry to urge action on Somali remittances.

The agencies said in a joint report released in Nairobi that humanitarian crisis looms following the move by banks in Australia, U.S., Britain and elsewhere to cut ties with the money transfer operators that make remittances possible to Somalia.

“Over 40 percent of people living in Somalia rely on remittances to meet their basic daily needs, such as food, health and education. Governments must urgently make good their promises to keep this crucial flow of cash open,” said Oxfam Somalia Country Director Enzo Vecchio.

“If not, 3 million Somalis risk going hungry this year. Families will not be able to afford health care, and a generation of children could be kept out of school,” Vecchio added.

Just three years on from a devastating famine that killed 258, 000, Somalia continues to be in the grips of humanitarian crisis.

Statistics show Somalis abroad remit 1.3 billion U.S. dollars back home annually, representing 25-45 percent of the country’s Gross Domestic Product.

U.S.-based Merchants Bank on Feb. 6 closed all accounts with Somali money transfer operators (MTOs).

According to the operators, Merchants Bank is responsible for transferring an estimated 60 percent to 80 percent of remittances from America to Somalia.

Similarly, in Australia, Westpac Bank has announced that it will close Somali remittance accounts soon, and last year in Britain, Barclays Bank also closed accounts of Somali MTOs.

“This is not just extra money; this is money that I need to survive on a daily basis,” Hawa Abdullahi Warsame, a Somali woman living in northern Somalia said in a report by the aid agencies.

“Not only am I dependent on it, but over 10 relatives – my entire extended family – are as well. I have sick relatives who need medication, and children that I am trying to provide an education for. This money is vital for that,” she said.

The Horn of Africa nation has no formal banking system and money transfer operators provide the services people in foreign countries would expect from a bank.

Degan Ali, Executive Director of the African Development Solutions (Adeso), said annual remittances to Somalia dwarf the yearly humanitarian aid, development aid and foreign direct investment budgets for Somalia combined.

“If banks end their relationships with money transfer operators, families stand to lose the only transparent means of cash transfer open to them,” Ali said.

“Many will be forced to use informal channels to send and receive funds from loved ones overseas, and ultimately much less money will go through,” she said.

The aid agencies said the steps taken by a number of Western governments over the past year have been largely positive, but ultimately not enough to prevent the critical lack of access to banking services that now exists for Somali MTOs.

The agencies said Britain has made some progress with its “Safer Corridors” initiative, which aims to build banks’ confidence in Somali MTOs by strengthening their accountability and transparency mechanisms.

The British government, however, needs to move quickly to implement the programme and ensure more active engagement with the banking sector.

In September 2014, the U.S. Treasury Department publicly acknowledged that MTO account closures could be disastrous for U.S. and Somali interests and promised to clarify expectations for banks partnering with MTOs perceived to be high risk.

The Treasury Department and USAID have also worked with Somalia’s Central Bank to improve its financial management systems.

The agencies warned that unless the U.S. government takes urgent and extraordinary action to restore the full flow of remittances through formal channels, many Somali families will struggle to survive.

Analysts say that while the closure of formal remittance channels would hurt Somali communities, it would benefit criminal networks that prey on informal money transfer systems that are invisible to regulators and law enforcement officials.

NAIROBI (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Oxfam, CARE and seven other aid agencies on Monday called on Barclays Bank to scrap plans to close several money transfer accounts that provide a lifeline to millions of Somalis who depend on remittances to survive.

Barclays had planned to close a number of accounts used by Somali transfer firms in the U.K. on Tuesday because of fears the funds might end up in the hands of groups branded as terrorists, such as the al Qaeda-linked al Shabaab.

The bank said on Monday afternoon it would postpone the closure of the accounts until September 30, a delay Oxfam said amounted to no more than “a short stay of execution.”

Diaspora remittances are the biggest foreign currency earner for Somalia, which is slowly emerging from two decades of civil conflict and recurrent drought. An estimated 600,000 to 800,000 Somalis living abroad send home about $1.3 billion a year to their relatives.

Somalis are finding it increasingly difficult to make these transfers because banks worry they will be held responsible if the money falls into the hands of militants. Virtually all major US banks have stopped offering remittance services to Somalia and Barclays is the only U.K. bank still doing so.

“The banking rules are illogical, cold hearted and counter-productive. It leaves families already struggling to make ends meet to go without,” said Mark Goldring, Oxfam’s chief executive.

“Somalia will find it hard to work its way out of poverty and instability while its people are needlessly denied the financial support from their loved ones abroad.”

WORSE THAN 2011 FAMINE

Last month, a senior United Nations official spoke out against Barclays’ plans, saying it would have a direct humanitarian impact on Somalia, where several regions of the country have barely emerged from famine.

The Overseas Development Institute, a British think-tank, warned that cutting remittances “could be even worse and much longer lasting than the 2011 famine”, which killed some 260,000 people.

Somalis in the U.K. send over $157 million a year to friends and families in Somalia, where the average income is about $300 a year.

It is impossible to send money from the West to Somalia via bank transfers because Somalia’s commercial banking system collapsed in the 1990s after the fall of dictator Siad Barre.

Instead, money is sent using money transfer operators, such as Dahabshiil, whose bank accounts gradually are being closed down.

Aid agencies said Barclays should delay plans to shut down the accounts for at least a year so that governments and banks can agree on regulations to enable money transfers to continue while addressing money laundering concerns.

In ruins: A boy stands in the shell of the parliament building in Somalia. Photo: Reuters

Compared with the trillions of dollars flowing through the international  financial system every day, the estimated $US1.3 billion ($1.46 billion) sent  each year from  storefronts in Somali neighbourhoods in places such as London  and Minneapolis to families back home in the Horn of Africa is a  droplet.

In a country where 40 per cent of the population depends on remittances from  relatives abroad, however, these transactions are a lifeline.  But the same  money transfer services that help keep children in school and older relatives  off the streets  can also be used to send money to help finance groups such as   al-Shabab, the feared Islamist militants who once controlled much of the  country.

Humanitarian groups, politicians and Somalis are now sounding the alarm over  plans by the British bank Barclays to suspend the accounts of a number of money  transfer companies  rather than risk a run-in with regulators over potentially  abetting the financing of terrorists or money laundering.

”Millions of people depend on the remittances from outside,” said Shukri  Ismail, one of the founders of Candlelight, a non-profit organisation in the  northern region of Somaliland. ”If those remittances stop, it will be literally  chaos.”

Mo Farah, the British Olympic gold medallist born in Somalia, has lent his  celebrity to the cause, asking for a 12-month extension before the cut-off.

”Everyone following the issue understands that Barclays has a bank to run,  but this decision could mean life or death to millions of Somalis,” Farah  said.

If the  transfer businesses are shut down, experts say,  transfers will not  go through other official channels but will be driven underground, making it  harder to track money going to militant groups.

Barclays has come under pressure because it is one of the last banks in  Britain providing services to the money transfer businesses.  In December, the  bank HSBC had to pay the US government a record fine of $US1.9 billion to settle  charges  it had worked with Saudi Arabian banks linked to terrorist  organisations.

New York Times

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/world/barclays-decision-could-transfer-pain-to-somalis-20130804-2r7fl.html#ixzz2bINru5Pg