Kampala — A few weeks ago I was invited to speak on a radio talk show in Uganda and responded to questions from listeners. One particular caller asked me my opinion as to what products could be made in Uganda and marketed in North America. I promised I would consider the questions in greater length before answering it.

In the subsequent weeks I have given this question significant thought and even conducted some in-field research.

What kind of products can local people in Uganda make for which a market either already exists or can be created in North America?

This is a much different proposition than finding markets for traditional products such as coffee and tea.

The products that immediately come to my mind are handicrafts. However, as I have asked others before, how many Ugandans in North America have ethnic Chinese handicrafts in their homes? The answer is probably very few. As such, it is reasonable to assume that handicrafts that are Ugandan will have a limited market in North America. And yet handicrafts are what can more readily be produced at the local level in Uganda.

After further consideration, a thought came to me that maybe local people in Uganda could learn to produce handicrafts that have a greater mass appeal than the ethnic handicrafts they have traditionally produced.

Following up upon this thought, I visited the Los Angeles Mart where professional companies represent the sale of gifts and decorative accessories from a multitude of countries around the world to retail buyers throughout North America.

During this visit, I realised that many of the products I was looking at could be found for retail sale in places like Cost Plus, Pier One and Ikea. So I visited several of these places too and even bought a few articles for further analysis.

Here are a few of my conclusions

• I believe that a potential market exists in North America for baskets that can be locally made in Uganda. The key here would be to closely study the existing competition and produce baskets that would compete equitably but in great volume and at low prices.

This brings to mind how manufacturers in Indonesia took over the chondo bags market in the US after studying original chondo bags from Kenya, reverse engineering them and then reproducing them at lower price points in massive quantities.

• Cost Plus, Pier One, Ikea and others all sell casual furniture made of wood and covered with natural fibres such as sisal, rattan and banana fibres.

Furniture similar in nature to this is already produced at the local level in Uganda.

I bought a chair made of wood and rattan from Ikea and found it to be of very poor quality. Indeed, the very day I brought it home it began to unravel and come apart. The Ikea chair cost me $50 (sh90,000). Similar chairs at the other stores went for as much as $100 (sh180,000) each.

As such, I believe that a potential market exists in North America for casual furniture made of wood and covered with natural fibres that are local available in Uganda. Here also, it would be a matter of closely analysing the competition and producing superior products in large quantities at competitive prices.

• The same stores also carried products made of wood and metal that I believe could be duplicated and improved upon by local artisans in Uganda, produced in large quantities and marketed at competitive prices.

Here again, the products I saw were designed to appeal to the masses (jewellery boxes and bowls) with just a hint of ethnic influence to set them apart from the rest.

l believe that a market could be found for other decorative accessories like wall hangings as long as they were not too ethnic in nature. This would require a delicate balance because the ethnic influence would have to set such accessories apart from the rest but without limiting their market appeal.

• I believe that opportunities also exist for products such as garments (designed for mass production and mass appeal but with a slight ethnic influence) and jewellery (think cow horn, stone and other non-restricted natural materials). However, I need to conduct more investigations before giving a specific opinion in this respect.

In conclusion, I believe that with sufficient local financial support, appropriate coordination, both in Uganda and in North America and an ongoing commitment to the production of quality items in a timely manner, we can capture the North American market.

Markets either already exist or could be developed for handicraft products manufactured at a local level in Uganda.

The writer is the president of the Ugandan North American Association