The Owino Market in Uganda's capital has long been a go-to enclave for rich and poor people alike looking for affordable but quality-made used clothes, underscoring perceptions that Western fashion is superior to what is made at home.
All service sector jobs rely on some sort of resource or on manufactured products. A full service economy is impossible. And especially when there is a low demand for services because people keep their resources for essential commodities.
The resource we are talking about is cheap clothing though. Producing cheap clothing just feels like digging holes to fill them back in again. Why would you want productive jobs that don’t actually produce anything of value? What would be the point of producing paperclips if someone either gave you a bunch of paperclips or sold them to you extremely cheaply?
I get the self reliance aspect. However for clothing I don’t think it’s as important because a country isn’t going to collapse if it can’t get clothing imports for a year, like it would if it were reliant on food imports.
Anyway, the over production of clothing for the West definitely is a problem, and it’s highlighted by cases like this. But I wouldn’t frame it as a necessarily a Ugandan problem. We shouldn’t glorify jobs or industry for the sake of jobs or industry, they should fill a purpose that isn’t filled in people’s needs and wants.
All service sector jobs rely on some sort of resource or on manufactured products. A full service economy is impossible. And especially when there is a low demand for services because people keep their resources for essential commodities.
The resource we are talking about is cheap clothing though. Producing cheap clothing just feels like digging holes to fill them back in again. Why would you want productive jobs that don’t actually produce anything of value? What would be the point of producing paperclips if someone either gave you a bunch of paperclips or sold them to you extremely cheaply?
I get the self reliance aspect. However for clothing I don’t think it’s as important because a country isn’t going to collapse if it can’t get clothing imports for a year, like it would if it were reliant on food imports.
Anyway, the over production of clothing for the West definitely is a problem, and it’s highlighted by cases like this. But I wouldn’t frame it as a necessarily a Ugandan problem. We shouldn’t glorify jobs or industry for the sake of jobs or industry, they should fill a purpose that isn’t filled in people’s needs and wants.