It's now been more than 10 months since I first touched down on Bamako soil - and I can say - the times are a changing. I would like to see the Western Union money transfer total for the month of Ramadan. Up until September, there had been a slow and gradual rhythm of a few more cars here and there, store facades sprouting up like mushrooms. But then in the month of Ramadan and forever after there has been this explosion of fancy cars (porche cayenne's, brand new bmws), fancy hairdressing shops, kids wearing jeans and designer t-shirts, men in super expensive basin. When I first came to Mali - there were no such things as hair salons or non-diesel, non government cars.
What happened? Why aren't we feeling the financial crisis in Bamako... I have a couple of guesses - 1 is that malians don't have access to credit. Credit has always been hard to get and expensive here (relatively). So - when there is a credit crunch - Malians aren't effected. Most Malians living abroad aren't citizens and therefore have difficulty creating a credit profile. The stuff that people buy is bought with cash and paid in full. My guess is that while the US has suffered this financial crisis, Malians expats have been scooping up stuff on sale and sending over here to Mali - where again - people buy stuff with cash.
Second, I want to talk to study people who study customs regulations in Bamako, but I have a sneaking suspicion that there has been a great deal of regulation and standardization this year. Sure, people who know people probably get out of most taxes, but I think the rules of the game are being applied more broadly and becoming more transparent - meaning more people can get into the import game.
Third, remittances, remittances, remittances, - western union and money gram - everyone is getting much more organized and Malians making money abroad can send it over here at their convenience. For just 8 euros you can send money from Europe and have an email receipt an hour later telling you someone picked it up. It costs about $2 to send money across Mali.
However, my observations apply to the capital city - BAMAKO. I just got back from the regional capital of Sikasso - near the Burkina/Cote d'Ivoire border and it was like being in Bamako 7 years ago. Tough to find a fan, a cool drink, or a working internet connection. We interviewed 100 respondents in Sikasso ville and then another 100 in 5 surrounding villages. It was a shocking reminder of the stark contrast between urban glitz of Bamako and rural poverty. Most shocking was speaking to female respondents from the villages. Mostly, men tried to prevent us from speaking to them (oh the women don't speak Bambara - meanwhile - they would greet and joke with us in Bambara as we walked past). When we did get a chance to speak to some women - they were so uniformed and unaware it was a truly overwhelming. The good news is that their daughters (for a large part) are going to school. Hopefully, if nothing else, school will empower them to observe and reflect on phenomena outside of the compound walls and feel capable of expressing their own preferences and opinions. It's hard to imagine that those rural kids reach high school and then travel off to university in Bamako, which seems like another planet.
*Research team with respondents in randomly selected village - Ntjibougou (Sikasso Region)
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