KHALED AL KHAWALDEH (ABU DHABI)

Partnership between the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and FIFA would aim to see “made in Africa” shirts worn by players at the 2026 World Cup to be held in the US, Canada and Mexico, according to  FIFA President Gianni Infantino.

The FIFA President delved into the organisation’s goals to advance cotton manufacturing in several West African nations at a side event of the World Trade Organisation Ministerial Conference being held in Abu Dhabi this week.

Speaking to WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala at the high level event on Saturday, Infantino discussed how the partnership between the two organisations would be used to create better value chains in the West African C4+ countries – Benin, Burkina Faso, Chad and Mali – as well as in Côte d’Ivoire. 

Infantino said the aim would be to develop and invest in the cotton industries in these countries to see them evolve from merely raw material producers to more sophisticated cotton processing nations.

H.E. Dr. Thani bin Ahmed Al Zeyoudi, UAE Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, and chair of the Ministerial Conference started the session with a message about the importance of creating a more equitable cotton industry and lauded the quality of West African cotton.

“For decades cotton has been a bedrock for many economies, football can bring much needed exposure to the cotton industry in West Africa,”Al Zeyoudi told the conference.

“The cotton produced in these countries is amongst the most sustainable in the world, it is handpicked, and rainwater irrigated.”

Infantino echoed the statements of Al Zeyoudi adding that creating cotton processing industries would allow African nations to reap the rewards of the $200 billion plus apparel industry  by allowing them to make higher profits by exporting products higher up on the value chain.

“FIFA wants to be part of real life. We develop football all over the world but we also know we have a social responsibility,”the FIFA President said.

“Football touches the emotions of people, so that is why we need to use football to help with people’s lives, the cotton produced in these countries is of top-top quality but the world doesn’t know about it.”

The special meeting held at Abu Dhabi National Exhibition Centre comes on the heels of a memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed between FIFA and the WTO in September 2022.

The MoU aimed to explore how best to use football to promote economic inclusion in developing countries, to analyse the economic impact of football and its role in unlocking global economic growth potential and to seek options for the development of capacity-building activities that support the use of football as a tool for women’s economic empowerment.

The MoU particularly focused on WTO’s cotton programme, which aims to improve the trade conditions in the cotton industry, particularly in relation to helping developing nations compete.

The cotton produced in these countries is among the most sustainable in the world, however, most is exported as a raw material rather than finished product.