2023-10-06 10:50:27
After the launch this summer of a campus bringing together the most innovative players in the trust economy in Switzerland, the leader in traceability solutions is taking advantage of its establishment in Africa to perfect the fight against trafficking that undermines finances. public and affect the health and safety of populations.
50,000 square meters of bay windows and green spaces; a capacity of 1,300 employees; nearly forty companies present (Ruag, SGS, Alpian, Fortinet, Visium, etc.), including around fifteen start-ups: by inaugurating, at the beginning of the summer, its brand new Unlimitrust campus, SICPA pulled out all the stops in the big ones. Located in Prilly, on the outskirts of Lausanne (Switzerland), the site aims to be the first of its kind to be entirely dedicated to “ the economy of trust “. A concept assumed by SICPA, the world leader in security inks and authentication, identification and traceability solutions, which wishes with this campus “ create a dynamic and collaborative ecosystem to drive innovation and encourage trust in physical and digital transactions ».
« In a world where the pace of innovation is accelerating, the Unlimitrust campus embodies SICPA’s desire to create a safer and more reliable world for all, through collaboration and the pooling of multiple expertise », According to the president of the Swiss company, Philippe Amon. Beyond the SICPA teams in charge of innovation, the incubator brings together several initiatives within a single location, intended to bring out new technologies ensuring the protection and traceability of products: such as the Trust Valley, a cybersecurity project of which SICPA is one of the founders; the Trust Village, supported by local authorities to support young Swiss start-ups; or the Economy of Trust Foundation, which aims to develop international collaborations and train leaders in the economy of trust.
SICPA chooses Morocco to develop new solutions
So many promises of internationalization which have not remained a dead letter. At the end of September, SICPA announced the conclusion of an agreement between the Swiss group and the Moroccan Foundation MAScIR (Moroccan Foundation for Advanced Science, Innovation and Research). Attached to the Mohammed VI Polytechnic University (UM6P) of Rabat, the MAScIR Foundation has aimed, since its creation in 2007, at the promotion and development of technological research centers in the fields of materials and nanomaterials, biotechnology, microelectronics and life sciences. It is therefore quite natural that the leaders of the two entities came together, since last February, to pool their efforts in favor of the emergence of an economy of trust on the African continent.
Concretely, the research project contract revealed a few days ago concerns the development of a new marking and detection solution, the outlines of which have not been precisely revealed. An innovation which will, however, promise both parties, stamped “Made in Morocco” and which should allow public and private actors to strengthen their technological arsenal in the fight against fraud, counterfeiting and non-compliant products. If nothing indicates that this solution will be reserved only for African groups and governments, it should not be seen as a coincidence in the fact that SICPA has chosen Morocco to develop its future products, because the continent is multiplying initiatives to limit the weight of the illicit trade.
Africa mobilizes against the illicit economy
Health, energy, food, etc.: in each of these sectors, illicit trade remains flourishing in Africa. A phenomenon which is not limited to the continent, the phenomenon also affecting Europe and Asia. A few figures give the measure of a phenomenon which, although relatively unknown, nonetheless threatens the economic and social prospects of the entire continent. In Africa, nearly one in three medicines is counterfeit; more than $130 billion worth of fuel is stolen each year; food fraud amounts to nearly $40 billion per year; etc. And for each box of counterfeit medicines, each barrel of stolen fuel, each food product that falls from the truck, there are fewer tax revenues for the States concerned – and therefore fewer means of action for public authorities.
For example, oil theft alone would have cost Nigeria more than $5.2 billion in 2021. So many reasons which led SICPA to recommend, in a report published at the start of the year, a strengthening of the systems anti-fraud traceability as already exists on certain products such as alcohol and tobacco. With spectacular results: by adopting tax marking solutions on this type of product, Tanzania recorded a 60% increase in taxes on alcohol, Togo an increase of 35%, Kenya a similar increase . In the cocoa segment, one of the country’s main sources of income, Ivory Coast has just launched a traceability system.
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