How to Vet an African Commodity Supplier: A Buyer's Checklist

At a glance

• Seven checks — legal identity, references, live video, lot-tied samples, independent inspection, a trial order and split payment — filter out almost all supplier fraud before money moves.
• The loudest alarm in the trade: an invoicing company name that does not match the receiving bank account.
• Ask for two or three trade references from buyers in different markets, with permission to contact them directly.
• A live video walkthrough of the warehouse costs nothing and cannot be faked with borrowed footage.
• Write third-party pre-shipment inspection (SGS, Bureau Veritas or equivalent) into the first contract — then watch the reaction.
• No verifiable supplier needs 100 per cent prepayment from a first-time buyer; a 30/70 TT split or a letter of credit is the working norm.

Let us start with the uncomfortable truth: buyer fraud is a real feature of the African commodity trade. Cloned websites, stolen photos, prices 20 per cent under market and a polite insistence on full payment in advance — the pattern repeats because it keeps working. As an exporter we have an obvious interest in saying 'trust us', so we will say something more useful instead: do not trust anyone yet, including us. Run every supplier through the seven steps below. A genuine exporter passes them without friction; a fake one disappears around step two.

Step 1 — Verify the legal entity

Ask for the business licence, tax identification number and the commodity-specific export permits for what you are buying — in Tanzania that can include commodity-board registration and TBS-registered processing where applicable. Then check the details independently rather than accepting the PDF at face value: registry lookups, a business address you can place on a map, and a company name that matches the bank account you will be asked to pay. A mismatch between the invoicing entity and the receiving account is the single loudest alarm in this trade.

Step 2 — Ask for trade references

Two or three references from buyers in different markets, with permission to contact them directly. Ask the references specific questions: was the delivered grade the contracted grade, how were discrepancies handled, did documents arrive in time for customs. A new exporter may have few references — that is honest and workable — but a supplier who claims years of volume and can produce nobody to vouch for it is telling you something.

Step 3 — Get on a video call, then get a video tour

A live video call costs nothing and filters out a remarkable share of fraud. Then ask for a live walkthrough of the warehouse or processing site — not a pre-recorded clip, which can be borrowed from anywhere, but a call where you can ask the person to turn the camera toward the stock, the scales, the bagging line. We host these regularly and consider the request completely normal.

Step 4 — Insist on samples with a lot identity

A courier sample should arrive with the lot number it was drawn from, so the trial shipment can be contracted against that same lot or its documented equivalent. A sample with no lot identity proves only that the supplier once had access to good product — not that the container will contain it.

Step 5 — Contract an independent inspection

Write third-party pre-shipment inspection into the first contract: SGS, Bureau Veritas or an equivalent body, checking weight, grade and condition at stuffing, at your cost or shared. Watch the reaction. A genuine supplier quotes it into the deal; an imposter negotiates hard against it, because the inspector is the one party they cannot charm.

Step 6 — Start with a trial order sized to lose

The first order should be an amount you can afford to have go wrong: one container, or an LCL parcel for higher-value goods. You are buying information — how the supplier handles documents, deadlines and the inevitable small surprise — and that information is cheap at trial scale and ruinous at programme scale.

Step 7 — Pay on terms that share the risk

No verifiable supplier needs 100 per cent before production from a first-time buyer. A 30/70 telegraphic transfer split or a letter of credit puts real skin in the game on both sides. Refusal to accept anything except full prepayment — especially to a personal account, or via money-transfer services — ends the conversation.

“Every step on this list is one we can pass on a Tuesday afternoon. That is exactly why we publish it — the checklist costs honest exporters nothing and costs the fakes everything.”

— Daniel Mahenge, Logistics Coordinator