At the Aflao border crossing between Ghana and Togo, there is a fully operational customs station running nearly 24 hours a day. About 200 metres away, there is an unmarked dirt path that most people would walk right past. That path is where the real economy moves.
Every day, women traders carry large metal pans and buckets of smoked sardines and processed fish balanced on their heads, slipping through narrow gaps in the bush to cross from Ghana into Togo and Benin. No forms. No queues. No waiting. Across this informal route, approximately 6,000 metric tons of processed fish travel each year, feeding households across the region.
This is not chaos. It is a highly organised, self-sustaining network built by women who control every level of the trade, from processing fish along Ghana's coast to selling at markets deep inside Togo and Benin. The system works precisely because the official one does not. Politicians debate policy and commission new terminals while these women have already built something that functions.
The economics explain everything. Fish accounts for 61 percent of what Ghanaian households spend on animal products and provides 70 percent of the animal protein people eat in Ghana. In Togo, fish covers 40 percent of dietary protein. The demand is real and constant. Yet at official checkpoints, traders routinely face long delays and officials who demand bribes ranging from 5,000 to 10,000 CFA francs, roughly 8 to 16 US dollars. For women selling lower-margin goods like smoked fish, those informal fees can erase an entire day's profit in a single stop.
When the formal system charges more than it offers, people build their own. The question worth asking is not why the informal economy thrives here. It is what it would take for the formal one to earn its place back.
Originally published by African Business.