* Gold, cotton output seen rising despite Mali coup and
rebellion
* Unlike neighbours, main industries appear shielded from
chaos
* Cracks appearing as aid, investment slows
By Joe Penney
BAMAKO, Sept 17 (Reuters) – In the afternoon of March 21,
army mutineers stormed the office of Mali’s national cotton
company CMDT in central Bamako and fired AK-47 rounds into the
air.
When the dust cleared, the soldiers – who were angry about
how the government was handling a northern rebellion – realised
they had made a mistake: they’d meant to take over the state
television headquarters next door. And so they left.
The CMDT’s offices still bear the bullet holes from that
day, which marked the start of a crisis in the West African
state that toppled an elected president and paved the way for
Islamists to wrest control of the north.
But the chaos that erupted in the months since the military
staged a coup d’etat has left the country’s twin economic
engines – the cotton and gold industries – essentially
untouched, in contrast to the vast economic damage caused by
coups and conflicts in West African neighbours like Guinea and
Ivory Coast.
Africa’s top cotton grower and its third-biggest gold miner
behind South Africa and Ghana, Mali is expected to produce more
cotton and gold in 2012 than it did last year, helping to
accelerate economic growth to around 6 percent and bridge a
budget gap left by frozen foreign aid since the coup.
Continued…
