The Civil War

TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

I-GENERAL PRESENTATION OF THE COMPANY

1) Nature and legal status

2) History

3) Business organization

3.1-Business structure

3.2-Flow of communication and management style

II-MY EXPERIENCE WORKING FOR THE BUSINESS

1) Department visited

2) Tasks performed

III- EVALUATION

1) Evaluation of the internship

2) Evaluation of the company

2.1-Quantitative data

2.2-SWOT analysis

2.3-Recommendations

IV-CONCLUSION

V-GLOSSARY OF TECHNICAL TERMS

VI- APPEENDIX

VII-REFERENCES

INTRODUCTION

In the aftermath of their independence, African countries took control of their economy. Then, Ivory Coast inheriting a fundamentally agricultural economy became more and more open to the outside adopting economic liberalism. It adopts a policy of diversification of its agriculture mainly based on annuity products (coffee, cocoa) grown in the southern forest regions.

In order to reduce income disparities between the northern and the central, and forest areas, the Ivorian government decided to develop in 1962 the cotton growing in savannahs areas.

The implementation of this project was entrusted to the French Company for the Development of Textiles (FCDT-CFDT in French) that managed this project up to 1974, when the Ivorian Company for the Development of Textiles (ICDT-CIDT in French) took over.

In the first part of this report, I made the presentation of the company in general, speaking about nature and legal status , history and business organization of this company. In the second part of this report, I tried to explain my experience working for the CIDT . Finally, I made an evaluation of both the internship and the company.

I-PRESENTATION OF THE "CIDT"

1) Nature and legal status

The CIDT, a triple vocation company (agricultural, industrial and commercial) mainly owned by the Ivorian government, is a limited company. It has been the first company in Côte d'Ivoire operating in the cotton field and has dominated this sector for many years until the privatization. Today, the company shares the market with many other companies like COIC, IVOIRE COTON, SICOSA, DOPA, and SECO. However, the most important one is IVOIRE COTON which is now the best performing company in the Ivorian cotton market. With a 7,200,000,000 FCFA ( ) equity divided into 360,000 shares with a nominal value of 20,000 FCFA (), the CIDT employs more than 2782 people in all the country and has an annual capacity of 17,000 tons of cotton seed. It went from 120,000 in 2002 to 17,000 tons today because of the political crisis that faced the country.

2) History

At the end of the 19th century, Ivory Coast already knew the cotton, cultivated in small quantities with very low yields. In 1902, the French mill owners, created a company, the Colonial Cotton Association which, for western Africa, settled down to Bouaké (the center of Ivory coast). The production passed from 6 tons of cotton seed in 1912 to 10 000 tons of cotton seed in 1965. The associations of development appeared in Ivory Coast in the middle of 1960s, then started increasing and growing as local companies of development.

In order to diversify its agricultural products and to reduce income disparities between center-north regions and forest regions, "CIDT" was founded in 1974 replacing the "CFDT"(The French compagny for the development of textiles) founded in 1962.

In 1998, with the vast privatization undertaken by the Ivorian government, The "CIDT" gave a portion of its assets to two private structures:

- The Ivorian Cotton Company (TICC=LCCI in French)

- Ivoire Cotton (IC)

Since then, its action area that was covering about 58% of the national cotton area, extended to about twenty departments

Unfortunately, the socio-political crisis that Ivory Coast faced has severely affected many companies operating in the country in general, but especially in the northern part where the "CIDT"operates. This situation dramatically affected its turnover until today. In fact, for the 2007-2008 campaign, the CIDT processed just 26,000 tons of cotton seed, and the equity decreased because of debts estimated to 29 billion FCFA ()

3)Business organization

3.1- Business structure

The structure reflects the skeleton of the organization. Note however that following the socio-political crisis facing the country, the company that has undergone many physical and financial losses, has experienced a restructuring that gives us the plan below:

- A chairmanship of a Board of directors

The president of the board of directors organizes meetings of the board and