Page 120 - DMGT547_INTERNATIONAL_MARKETING

Unit 6: Negotiation and Decision Making

Notes
of 87% from the peak of 230000 tonnes in 1964. Since then production has stagnated at
around 30000–33000 tonnes per annum. Needless to say Tanzania has long since ceased to
be the number one world producer and its export earnings fallen well behind that of
coffee, cotton tea, tobacco and cashew nuts. Since 1985 Tanzania has been producing 7–9%
of the world’s sisal fibre exports and is in fourth place behind Brazil, Morocco and Kenya.
The decline in sisal production came in two stages, an initial stage up to 1987 and then 1990
onwards. Both internal and external factors account for the decline. In the initial stage, the
internal factors included the nationalisation of some of the sisal estates in the late 1960’s,
an overvalued exchange rate, high export taxes and a controlled single channel marketing
system. In the second stage, liquidity problems affected production. However, the external
factors in the two periods had the most significant effect and show clearly the consequences
of an ill prepared intelligence system. In the initial stage up to 1987 Tanzania experienced
declining world prices of sisal fibre and the introduction of a substitute, cheap synthetic
fibre -polypropylene twines. These factors led to low investment in replanting, leaf
transport facilities and factory machines at the estate level. In the second stage of the 1990’s
onwards, the collapse of the former USSR, one of the major markets for Tanzania sisal
fibre and changing world demand were the major factors. An inability to pick up these
changes in demand by the intelligence system was a major player in the industry collapse.
However, there is a ray of hope with a new swing worldwide to more “greener” and more
environmentally friendly products. Tanzania sisal could make a comeback.

Source: http://www.fao.org/docrep/W5973E/w5973e09.htm#chapter 5: identifying market
opportunities through marketing information system

6.2 Process of International Marketing

Following are the steps of International Marketing:

Identifying the International Markets

Analyzing international marketing opportunities to identify unfulfilled or under fulfilled needs
that a marketer may satisfy through its products or services. This analysis can be done through
information seeking and analysis or through market research (secondary or primary data
collection and analysis). A marketer may have a product or service concept developed first and
looks for the needs in the market that can be satisfied by these products or services. The marketer
may also first identify unfulfilled or under fulfilled needs in the market and then develop a
suitable product or service offer to satisfy these identified needs.
The World is your oyster. You can choose any country to go into. So you conduct country
identification – which means that you undertake a general overview of potential new markets.
There might be a simple match – for example two countries might share a similar heritage,
e.g. the United Kingdom and Australia, a similar language, e.g. the United States and Australia,
or even a similar culture, political ideology or religion, e.g. China and Cuba. Often selection at
this stage is more straightforward.

Example: A country is nearby, e.g. Canada and the United States. Alternatively your
export market is in the same trading zone, e.g. the European Union. Again at this point it is very
early days and potential export markets could be included or discarded for any number of
reasons.

LOVELY PROFESSIONAL UNIVERSITY 115