MB :
I am not from Somaliland but here is my opinion.
Somaliland could become much richer over 20–30 years by focusing on a few areas: make Berbera a major trade and logistics hub, improve roads and electricity, invest heavily in education and technical skills, support livestock processing and fisheries instead of exporting mostly raw products, make it easier and safer for diaspora money to become business investment, and strengthen courts, contracts, taxation, and anti-corruption systems.
The Netherlands became wealthy partly by turning its location into an advantage: ports, shipping, agriculture, trade, and efficient infrastructure. Somaliland could try something similar with Berbera by connecting it more strongly to Ethiopia and the wider Horn of Africa. Instead of only earning money when goods pass through the port, Somaliland would benefit more if warehouses, factories, food processing, repair services, trucking companies, and export businesses also grew around it.
Switzerland offers another lesson: a country does not need huge natural resources to become wealthy. Skills, reliable institutions, finance, specialised businesses, and political stability can be more valuable than oil or minerals. Somaliland would therefore need to make education much more practical—engineering, construction, healthcare, IT, accounting, logistics, and vocational training.
The biggest obstacle is that development requires long-term stability and predictable rules. Investors can tolerate a small market, but they are much less willing to invest large amounts when contracts, politics, security, or property rights are uncertain.
2026-08-09 07:07:39