Impact of Trade Liberalization on Mali's Economy

In the early 1980s, under pressure from the Bretton Woods institutions, Mali, like other developing countries, embarked on a process aimed at eventually liberalizing its economy, both internally and externally. This process was part of the Structural Adjustment Programs (SAPs) drawn up and implemented by the aforementioned institutions. By attributing, on the basis of speculation, the virtues of economic and social development to economic liberalization, the Bretton Woods institutions precipitated the Malian economy into a logic of "excessive liberalization". More than thirty years after the beginning of the process of liberalization of its economy, and after the implementation of structural reforms with disastrous social consequences, Mali does not seem to be progressing along the path of development. Worse still, foreign competition has destroyed the embryonic industrial fabric resulting from the investment efforts made during the implementation of the first five-year economic and social development plan, covering the period 1961-1965.