Making Globalisation Work for Producers and Consumers

Globalisation has mostly worked for the middle man. Intermediaries have pushed down their manufacturing costs by transferring work to lower paid parts of the world. Whilst they have pushed down their costs they have not lowered their prices. Neither consumer nor producer benefits but the man in the middle's profit increases. 

There is a different model. 

The great power of the internet is its ability to connect people. The next big revolution in business will be to cut out intermediaries and instead allow producers to sell directly to consumers. There are already examples of this happening with food (with farmers selling directly to consumers cutting out supermarkets), property (with home owners cutting out estate agents and selling directly to buyers) and music (with artists bypassing record companies and crowd-funding their albums). 

I recently visited a rural village called Gyetiase in the Ashanti region of Ghana with  a fantastic volunteers' charity: Ashanti Development. 

One of the projects that I saw when I was there was a dressmaking school for young single mothers. These young women pay a few pennies a term and are taught to be seamstresses. This is a trade that will earn them a decent living. The women make wonderful hand-made garments that they sell at the market in the neighbouring town of Mampong. They also make all of the school uniforms for the local schools.

While there is a relatively sizable local market for the hand-made garments there is a much, much bigger global market for hand-made clothes.  

If you want a handmade shirt or dress or blouse you can buy one direct from the seamstresses in Gyetiase using this website: www.ashantibespoke.com

You, as a consumer, get a great hand made garment. The seamstresses, as the producers, get a good wage and meaningful training. Any surplus goes to Ashanti Development to make more of these projects.

Why pay an intermediary when there is no added value? Direct trade and the technology that facilitates it will be the next big disruptive force.