East Africa: SACU Signs Trade, Investment Agreement With US

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The Namibian (Windhoek)

18 July 2008
Posted to the web 18 July 2008

Charles W. Corey

The United States trade representative, Ambassador Susan Schwab, and her counterparts from east and southern Africa signed two important trade and investment agreements that will further deepen and expand US trade ties with those regions.

One agreement marks the first trade, investment and development cooperative agreement (TIDCA) with the Southern African Customs Union (SACU).

Schwab participated in the signing with SACU trade ministers from Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia, Swaziland and South Africa.

The ministers were in Washington attending the seventh annual African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) Forum, July 14-16.

"This important agreement will provide a framework for the United States and SACU to work together to create the building blocks that could lead to a free trade agreement (FTA) in the long term," Schwab told the ministers, business executives and diplomats in attendance.

"Before we address the issues of an FTA, we are using the new TIDCA to expand market access, strengthen the links between trade and economic development strategies, encourage greater foreign investment and promote regional economic integration and growth," she said.

The TIDCA will be a formal mechanism for the United States and SACU to conclude a range of trade-related agreements, cooperative work and other trade-enhancing initiatives.

It also will allow the United States and SACU to develop work plans on key issues such as food safety standards and technical barriers to trade and investment promotion that should lead to increased US-SACU trade and investment in the near future.

Speaking for SACU, Executive Secretary Tswelopele C. Moremi called the agreement "an important step in reaching a long-term and sustainable trade relationship" between the region and the United States that will improve investment flows on both sides.

Popane Lebesa, Lesotho's minister of trade and industry, called the signing an "important milestone" that puts trade and investment on a stable platform for further development.

The United States and SACU launched FTA negotiations in 2003, but the talks were suspended in April 2006, largely due to differing views on the scope of the agreement.

In November 2006, the United States and SACU agreed to pursue a new type of agreement - a TIDCA - that could enhance the US-SACU trade and investment relationship in the short term and help lead the United States and SACU to a possible FTA in the longer term.

SACU is the United States' largest non-oil trading partner in sub-Saharan Africa, with bilateral trade valued at US$15,8 billion in 2007.

SACU is also the largest beneficiary of the AGOA, with American imports valued at US$2,9 billion, including a wide range of goods such as automobiles, minerals and metals, diamonds, agricultural products, chemicals, transportation equipment, footwear, textiles and apparel.

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