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tralac’s Daily News Selection
The selection: Wednesday, 6 July 2016
Profiled regional integration, development cooperation updates:
Strategy for Sweden’s regional development cooperation in Sub-Saharan Africa 2016-2021
Within the framework of this strategy, Swedish development cooperation with sub-Saharan Africa is to contribute to increased regional integration and strengthened capacity to face cross-border challenges and opportunities at regional level.
Incubator for integration and development in East Africa: call for applications
The East African Community Secretariat, in collaboration with the Regional Dialogue Committee, in partnership with GIZ proposes the Incubator for Integration and Development in East Africa (IIDEA) - an initiative which incubates small-scale regional integration projects, proposed and implemented by civil society, private sector and other interest groups in East Africa. It is cross border in nature, with projects expected to involve at least two EAC Partner States in the following areas: health, education, agriculture, trade, ICT, art and culture, security. Deadline for submissions: 31 July 2016.
Profiled conference alerts:
Ministerial Conference on Ocean Economy and Climate Change in Africa (World Bank)
The African Ministerial Conference and Investment Forum (1-2 September in Mauritius) will be a decision-forcing event that will: (i) muster international political leadership and elevate the international political discourse, narrative and momentum on the interconnectedness of the ocean economy and climate change agendas; (ii) place Mauritius as an African international center of ocean economic forum to attract African leadership, as well as institutional investors and donors in the area of ocean economy and climate change; (iii) prepare the grounds for the announcement of an ‘African Oceans Finance Package’ for the benefit of African countries in the region that will be carried through to COP-22 (Marrakesh).
On Friday, in Geneva: ‘From LDC services waiver to GSPs: follow-up’ (UNCTAD)
The recent services Waiver for LDCs that was adopted at the Eighth WTO Ministerial Conference in 2011 and extended in Nairobi in 2015 could potentially serve as a stepping stone towards further services liberalization. Aimed at least-developed countries only, the waiver has a potential to provide a comparative advantage so much needed to kick-start LDCs services trade on international markets. However, while estimating real life benefits of the preferences generated by the Waiver, one has to consider the following issues: [Downloads include: draft review of The LDC Services Waiver – operationalized?, pdf]
Global value chains and trade in value-added: an initial assessment of the impact on jobs and productivity (pdf, OECD)
This report contributes to a better understanding of the impact of global value chainson jobs and productivity by providing new evidence based on employment data collected within the Trade in Value Added (TiVA) project. Linking jobs data to TiVA indicators first highlights that a large share of employment in OECD and key partner countries relies on consumption taking place abroad and for most countries this share has increased between 1995 and 2011. If for a large country like the United States, 10% of the workforce is involved in production for foreign final consumption, the share goes up to 20% for France, 29% for Germany and 47% for a small open economy like Ireland. Based on a value-added approach, the calculation includes both the employees of exporting firms and the workers of all the domestic firms providing inputs to exporters. In the People’s Republic of China, there are more workers ‘indirectly’ involved in exports (i.e. working in the supplying industries) than in the exporting industries. These figures are however still underestimating the number of persons involved in global value chains as activities of foreign-owned firms producing for domestic consumers are not taken into account. [Spatial development and agglomeration economies in services: lessons from India (World Bank), Collaboration is key to the South African supply chain (Global Trade)]
Middle Africa & Brexit: a leap into the unknown (pdf, Ecobank Research)
The key to transforming the UK’s trade and investment flows with Africa will be the negotiation of new bilateral deals. The UK is likely to start with boosting bilateral ties with its strongest African partners in Anglophone Africa, led by South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya & Ghana. These new deals could be tailored to fit the make-up of each bilateral trade relationship, focusing on particular flows of goods and services in mutually beneficial trade-offs, rather than the one-size-fits-all EU deal. The UK could also seriously step up its investment in Francophone West Africa, home to the intra-regional trading & commodity giants, Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal. This region has long been ignored by British companies who have left business opportunities to French companies while they focus on Anglophone African markets. Francophone African markets are ripe for disruption and innovation, and many local businesses are dissatisfied with the deals they receive from French companies and would be keen to find new international partners.
Fitch expects Brexit to have limited effect on SA (Business Day)
Brexit will have limited effect on the sovereign credit ratings of SA and other countries in the Middle East and Africa region, ratings agency Fitch said in a research note released on Monday night. "Short-term effects could come via market volatility, while a slowdown in British and European growth could weigh on MEA economies at a time of already heightened strains," Fitch’s senior director of sovereign ratings, Jan Friederich, wrote in the note.
Brexit has no long-term effects on EAC - capital markets chief (New Times)
Robert Mathu, the executive director of Capital Market Authority in Rwanda, said the loss of value in the Pound Sterling has effects on the commodities, where regional countries are exporting tea, coffee, will gradually decrease because exchanging into dollars also requires purchasing other needed commodities from China and other counties. “These are short-term; I hope that the long term effects will not be realised since the UK is going to review and discuss the agreement on the trade that she had with the EU and other worldwide partners especially the agreements she had with the member countries of the EU,” Mathu said. What regional countries can do to minimise the effects of Brexit, the capital markets chief added, is to reduce the trade done in Pound Sterling and preparing new agreements with the British.
Commentaries by Joseph Stiglitz, 'From Brexit to the future' (Project Syndicate), and Xhantyi Payi, 'Africa must learn lessons of unification pitfalls' (Business Day)
Selected updates on Zimbabwe's trade policy:
Over 3 000 import licences issued (The Herald)
Government has so far issued over 3 100 import licences for goods worth around $23 million since 20 June, three days after gazetting of import control regulations on various grocery and building material products. However the removal of the goods from the Open General Import Licence has been misconstrued as a ban on the importation of the products, triggering violent protests from cross-border traders and South African businesses who are resisting its implementation. Industry and Commerce Minister Mike Bimha reiterated that the intended purpose of the measures is not to ban the importation of the listed products but to regulate their influx into Zimbabwe. [Statement: Concerned Church and Christian Leaders]
Traders hit hard by new import restrictions (NewsDay)
Nyatanga’s echoes the sentiments of other cross-border traders who said they “cannot allow the government to mess with their lives when there are no jobs.” Residents in separate interviews said they cannot be forced to buy expensive groceries and goods from local shops when “we can easily buy them at half the price or less from cross border traders.” The import bans will also affect many families that rely on goods and groceries sent through omalayitsha every month-end, a Mpopoma resident, Gilbert Sibanda, said. “It made a lot of sense to buy groceries in South Africa and send them via omalayitsha than to send Rands through money transfer agencies which will not buy much owing to the exchange rate,” Sibanda said. [French envoy tears into import ban (NewsDay)]
‘Delays affecting export earnings’ (The Herald)
Zimbabwe could lose hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue if Government does not urgently eliminate cumbersome processes delaying the efficient movement of exports. Addressing a Public Private Dialogue on Simplification of Zimbabwe’s Export Processes yesterday, the chief of Trade Facilitation and Policy for Business Section, International Trade Centre Rajesh Aggarwal said delays in processing exports have a negative on exports. “If you delay your exports by one day you can actually make one day loss in export profits,” said Mr Aggarwal. ZimTrade chief executive officer Sithembile Priscilla Pilime told the dialogue that punitive penalties charged by Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe for late acquittals were also affecting exports. [Africa Confidential's London conference: Zimbabwe 2016, Rebuilding and Rebooting]
EAC govts urged to train technocrats in negotiation of trade agreements (New Times)
According to Henry Kimera of Consumer Food Education Trust (Uganda), with commercial oil and gas deposits being confirmed in almost all the six EAC countries, government must sharpen negotiation skills of technocrats so that they are able to negotiate better deals to ensure maximum benefit for countries. Kimera added that most regional technocrats negotiate from a point of weakness since they are not well-versed with international trade negotiation and other economic agreements, including oil deals. He was speaking during a two-day regional conference on how EAC can achieve structural transformation and sustainable development that was organised by Southern and Eastern Africa Trade Information and Negotiations Institute (SEATINI-Uganda) in Kampala last week.
Tanzania: Record 13.371tri/- tax collection (Daily News)
The Tanzania Revenue Authority has registered a milestone record in tax collection for the 2015/16 financial year, collecting 13.371 trillion/-; hence surpassing the 13.366 trillion/- target. The achievement is a huge boost to TRA, which failed to meet its revenue collection targets for the past five years or so. For instance, during the 2012/13 financial year, TRA was required to collect 8.05tri/- but the target was missed by about three per cent. Similarly, the authority missed its target of Sh10.395tri/- by a massive 10% for the entire 2013/14 financial year. The move to plug tax loopholes has also seen the revenues from customs at the Dar es Salaam port going up despite significant drop of cargo volume since end of the last year. Mr Kidata said they were usually collecting between 200bn/- and 300bn/-annually from the port. However, for last April and June, the authority pocketed 458bn/- and 517bn/- respectively. [Foreign body wades into tourism tax row, Coffee exports earn Tanzania 294.4bn/- (Daily News)]
India, Mozambique to sign MOU on import of pulses (Business Standard)
The Cabinet on Tuesday cleared a proposal to enter into an agreement with Mozambique for import of 100,000 tonnes of pulses in 2016-17. The decision comes just ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s proposed visit to African nations. The proposal also has an option to scale the import up to 200,000 tonnes by 2020-2021. The agreement will promote production of pigeon peas, or tur, in Mozambique by encouraging progressive increase in trading. The pulses would be imported either through private channels or through state agencies, an official statement issued after the Cabinet meeting said.
Taveta OSBP boosts transit cargo through port of Mombasa (Business Daily)
Customs officials are betting on the efficiency at the Taveta one-stop border post to boost transit cargo and increase cross-border trade. The Kenya Revenue Authority border post manager Daniel Nyambaka said the OSBP has already started paying dividend, saying trucks take 30 minutes to cross the border compared to up to five hours previously. Mr Nyambaka said they expect trucks transporting goods to Burundi, the DRC and Rwanda to use the route since it cuts the distance between Mombasa to DRC by up to 400 kilometres. The Mwatate-Taveta road which is being tarmacked is also expected to be completed by end of the year, heightening expectation that there will be increased traffic when the road is completed. The development comes at a time when the Kenya Ports Authority (KPA) has announced its plan to construct an Inland Container Depot (ICD) at Taveta to leverage on increased business at the border post.
Floods deal ‘staggering’ blow to pastoralists recovering from Ethiopia’s long drought (UN)
EAC targets $8m from South Sudan (The Citizen)
Facilitating e-commerce can stimulate growth and development – DG Azevêdo (WTO)
The politics of commercial diplomacy, Ex-Im and beyond (Brookings)
Helmut Reisen: 'How China’s rebalancing affects Africa’s development finance' (OECD)
Africa meeting assesses Hub and Spokes Programme (Commonwealth)
African cities may be able to leapfrog challenge of rapid growth, says Sisulu (Business Day)
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