Heads of State drawn from the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) are keen to see the incorporation of small and medium enterprises under the impending border-less trade on the continent. The leaders who were represented at the opening of COMESA’s high level business summit in Nairobi on Wednesday lay emphasis on the growth of the micro-enterprises who between themselves contribute to the largest share of jobs and Gross Domestic Product (GDP) output. “Each government should have the political will to support SMEs as they wouldn’t be able to penetrate a continental market by themselves. Further, we risk developing a free market which only serves the big boys,” noted Zambia’s President Edgar Lungu. While the continent is adequately resourced with a hardworking and enterprising populace, trade between partner states has remained well below average as exports to the rest of the world remain dominant. Intra-trade within COMESA accounted for a mere Ksh.814 billion ($7.9 billion) in 2017 in comparison to a greater share of Ksh.9 trillion ($86.9 billion) in total global exports. Acting Mauritian President Paramasimuv Pillay attributed the depressive trade play-out to continued barriers to regional trade to further pile pressure on partner states who remain keen on sheltering their internal markets from any external influence. “We must promote policies and measures to better the business climate by, for instance, eliminating barriers to SME licensing. We can also seek to relax some of the rules of origin to enable enterprises to source for raw materials widely,” he...

Speaking during the opening ceremony of Source 21 COMESA business summit, Kenyatta also urged the member states to explore different products that they could trade with and encouraged them to trade amongst themselves. “We need to come up with innovative and practical strategies to promote industrialization and enhance trade in our region,” Kenyatta said. Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni also urged COMESA member states to integrate its highly fragmented market and follow in the footsteps of China which despite having a huge internal market, continues to pursue other markets. “China has an internal market of 1.3 billion people, yet they are fighting for other markets. They are fighting with the US to get more market, yet we continue to be satisfied with a small market,” Museveni said. In 2017, Intra-COMESA trade exports hit USD 7,914 from USD 7,757 in 2016. In 2017, COMESA trade imports hit USD 8,243 a rise from USD 7,307 BACK IN 2016. Kenya is currently holding the Source 21 COMESA International Trade Fair and High – Level Business Summit under the theme “The Hallmark of Quality”. The summit also includes a presidential public-private round table where heads of states interact with business leaders on key strategies to enhance industry competitiveness and formulate strategies to enhance local sourcing and intra-regional trade. The event has attracted members of the COMESA region aimed at increasing trade across Africa and to international states. Source: Capital News

The ink on the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA)agreement is dry and the players are ready to trade, but a large and complicated hurdle remains - non-tariff barriers (NTBs). NTBs are a wide range of restrictive regulations and procedures, other than tariffs, that make trade difficult and/or costly. They are one of the main roadblocks to trade on the African continent – much more than tariffs and include customs clearance delays, restrictive licensing processes, certification challenges and rules of origin. “The time and costs of moving goods in Africa will be reduced if there is political willingness to fight non-tariff barriers,” UNCTAD Secretary-General Mukhisa Kituyi said. AfCFTA online NTBs reporting tool by UNCTAD and the African Union UNCTAD and the African Union are taking on these barriers through an online tool that aims to facilitate quicker and more efficient trade. Niger’s president, Issoufou Mahamadou, and Dr. Kituyi presented the new tradebarriers.africa platform to the African Union at the 12thAfrican Union Extraordinary Summit in Niamey, Niger on 7 July. “Looking at the map of Africa, one has a sad feeling of facing a broken mirror. Our generation has the historic responsibility of breaking these borders,” Mr. Mahamadou said. “The AfCFTA will benefit all Africans.” The AfCFTA non-tariff barriers online mechanism is designed to improve intra-African trade by offering a site for reporting and resolving non-tariff barriers experienced by businesses, particularly small ones, and those owned by women and youth. Lowering and managing non-tariff barriers better will also help maximize the anticipated benefits of the free...

July 10—Ugandan logistic firms are teaming up with relevant government institutions to organize an expo intended to highlight bottlenecks and find solutions in the industry amidst moves for closer regional integration in the East African Community (EAC). “Right now, the sector is fragmented. There is also no specific regulations, or statistics on the sector. If we are going to participate competitively in the EAC and beyond, we must be organised as a sector in the areas I have mentioned,” Hussein Kiddedde, who chairs the Uganda Freight Forwarders Association (UFFA) said during news conference Tuesday. A notable characteristic of Uganda’s freight business was expressed in a 2017 report published by the Overseas Development Institute (ODI), ‘Most of the cargo transport between Mombasa and Kampala occurs in an outbound direction, i.e. trucks driving towards Kampala are typically fully loaded while trucks driving in the direction of Mombasa are often empty’. UFFA, in partnership with the National Logistics Platform, Uganda Revenue Authority (URA) and the Ministry of Transport and Works is to hold the Second Regional Logistics Expo 2019 on August 21 in Kampala. Officials said they want to bring together the public and private sector to discuss developments, challenges and the way forward for the logistics sector. Private Sector Foundation-Uganda (PSFU) executive director, Gideon Badagawa said Uganda is well positioned to be a regional trade distribution hub. However he said there is a need for the logistics sector to reorganize due to its importance in the regional supply chain. “There is a...

Leading East African planning, design, architecture and engineering team FBW Group is playing its part in the drive to transform the region’s logistics sector and boost trade opportunities. FBW is part of a consortium currently carrying out feasibility studies centred on the creation of special ‘trade and logistics clusters’ near borders and points of entry in countries across East Africa. Aid-for-trade organisation TradeMark Africa (TMA), funded by UK AID and other donors, is behind the strategy to create special industrial parks and export processing zones to attract investors and boost trade, stimulate growth and create more jobs and better jobs. It is looking to invest $400m to create a million new jobs by 2022 by reducing trade costs by 10 per cent and increasing exports by 25 per cent. FBW Group has operations in Uganda, Kenya, Rwanda and Tanzania, and a team of more than 30 professionals delivering high value construction and development projects in the region. It is part of a consortium led by international development consulting company IPE Global that is currently studying possible logistics cluster sites across a number of locations. FBW’s role is to examine the ‘buildability’ of sites and to undertake physical assessments to assess their potential and viability. Moving forward, the group will be involved in master planning schemes that are being taken forward and the preparation of designs for contractor tenders. FBW Group managing director Paul Moores, based in Kampala, said: “We’re delighted to be playing our part in this truly transformation project...

Last week, the UK joined countries from around the world at the World Trade Organisation’s (WTO) annual Aid for Trade Global Review, calling on our trading partners to help boost developing countries’ participation in the global trading system. Trade is a key driver of economic growth and can trigger positive changes in developing economies; helping to raise incomes, create jobs and lift people out of poverty. Thanks in no small measure to free and open trade, a billion people have been taken out of absolute poverty in one generation, boosting global prosperity and security. All of this is bolstered by developing countries’ membership of the WTO. In joining the world’s largest trade organisation, nations gain improved market access to almost every nation in the world; a cost-effective way to negotiate better trade terms with all 164 members at once; consistent and predictable trade rules that allow businesses to export and invest with confidence; and access to a fair mechanism to resolve disputes with other nations. As one of the world’s largest economies and most vocal advocates of free and fair trade, the UK is committed to ensuring that developing countries can participate fully in the global system. We must also ensure that development and global prosperity are at the heart of our trade policy.  We need a WTO which empowers all WTO members, including developing nations, to help build open and competitive markets that work for all of us. This means ensuring that developing countries have the knowledge, skills and...

Regional countries are set to increase market access for their agricultural products following the commencement of a new capacity building project to mainstream sanitary and phytosanitary standards (SPS) priorities into national policies. The project is titled: ‘Mainstreaming SPS capacity building into the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) and other National Policy Frameworks to Enhance Market Access’. The project has a budget of US$ 464,075 out of which US$ 390,075 is provided by the Standards and Trade Development Facility (STDF) a World Trade Organization (WTO) agency. The project covers five countries that are members of the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA); Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, Ethiopia and Malawi. It is being implemented under the ‘Prioritizing SPS Investments for Market Access (P-IMA) framework, an initiative of the STDF. Kenya is the second country after Uganda, to start implementing the project with the inception meeting and high-level stakeholder dialogues. The events bring together experts from the private sector, relevant public sector departments and institutions of government to build consensus on the most critical SPS priorities and investments. The P-IMA framework is an evidence-based approach to inform and improve SPS planning and decision-making processes. It helps to link SPS investments to public policy goals including export growth, agricultural productivity, and poverty reduction. Principal Secretary in the Ministry of Trade Dr Chris Kiptoo, represented by the Assistant Director of External Trade Mrs. Helen Kenani, opened the meeting. In his statement, he said the variation of SPS capacity across COMESA countries and the...

Kigali 2 July 2019 (ECA) - In an effort to accelerate the implementation of the AfCFTA, Trademark East Africa and the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) signed in  June 2019 a Memorandum of Understanding, which provides the two parties with the framework to collaborate, with the aim of paving the way for stronger cooperation in helping countries increase their levels of intra-regional trade and investments. To cement that partnership, the two institutions successfully collaborated in an event organised by TradeMark Africa under the topic:  Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA): Women and Youth are Crucial to Africa's Economic Transformation. The session was held during the 2019 European Development Days meeting on the 18th-19thJune in Brussels, During the meeting, Andrew Mold, Acting Director of ECA in Eastern Africa explained the ambitious nature of the AfCFTA, saying that AfCFTA is not, as its name denotes, simply a 'free trade area'. "It encompasses ambitions to proceed to a single unified continental market", he said. Mold stressed that the elimination of tariff and non-tariff barriers and harmonization of standards called for under the AfCFTA represent a unique opportunity to boost intra-regional trade and investment, allowing companies and farmers to tap into rapidly growing markets of Africa. "Sectors that are set to benefit the most are the labour-intensive manufacturing and services industries where women and youth are well represented," he emphasized. The Chief Technical Officer of TradeMark Africa, Allen Asiimwe, told the participants at the meeting that: 'Policymakers should start looking at the collective power...

Kigali 2 July 2019 (ECA) - In an effort to accelerate the implementation of the AfCFTA, Trademark East Africa and the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) signed in June 2019 a Memorandum of Understanding, which provides the two parties with the framework to collaborate, with the aim of paving the way for stronger cooperation in helping countries increase their levels of intra-regional trade and investments. To cement that partnership, the two institutions successfully collaborated in an event organised by TradeMark Africa under the topic: Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA): Women and Youth are Crucial to Africa's Economic Transformation. The session was held during the 2019 European Development Days meeting on the 18th-19thJune in Brussels, During the meeting, Andrew Mold, Acting Director of ECA in Eastern Africa explained the ambitious nature of the AfCFTA, saying that AfCFTA is not, as its name denotes, simply a 'free trade area'. 'It encompasses ambitions to proceed to a single unified continental market', he said. Mold stressed that the elimination of tariff and non-tariff barriers and harmonization of standards called for under the AfCFTA represent a unique opportunity to boost intra-regional trade and investment, allowing companies and farmers to tap into rapidly growing markets of Africa. 'Sectors that are set to benefit the most are the labour-intensive manufacturing and services industries where women and youth are well represented,' he emphasized. The Chief Technical Officer of TradeMark Africa, Allen Asiimwe, told the participants at the meeting that: 'Policymakers should start looking at the collective power...

At the time of writing, US commerce secretary Wilbur Ross was set to provide the details of the new US-Africa policy, Prosper Africa, on the sidelines of the US-Africa Business Council 2019. This new initiative seeks to accelerate two-way investment and trade with Africa as a way to advance the US’s competitive advantage. In the following article, I detail my thoughts on what the policy needs to include in order to fulfil the promise of the African Continental Free Trade Area (CFTA). The place and timing of this announcement, on June 19-21 in Maputo, Mozambique, could not be more propitious. In March this year, Cyclone Idai made landfall in Mozambique, levelling a city of 400,000 and – along with Cyclone Kenneth – leaving in its wake $3.2bn worth of destruction. This was a foreshadowing of Africa’s acute vulnerability to the increasing intensity of extreme weather events and limited ability to adapt. Climate change compounds existing challenges of state fragility, infrastructure deficit, and high unemployment. Meanwhile, the CFTA went into force on 30 May. It carries the continent’s hopes and ambitions for connectivity, industrial development, job creation, and improved quality of life. The CFTA will be of mutual benefit to both the US and Africa. It will open new markets for American goods and services. When Ross takes the stage in Maputo, his speech will be the first substantive response by a major development partner to the latest vehicle on which Africans have pinned their hopes. This mix of challenge and...