The selection: Monday, 3 October 2016

President Kenyatta has announced, today, that @AMB_A_Mohammed is vying for the position of @_AfricanUnion Commission Chair

Concluding today, in Addis: draft Services Sector Development Programme workshop: The objectives of the meeting are to: review and enrich the draft Services Sector Development Programme (SSDP), develop capacity building for member states and RECs in tailoring the SSDP to their respective jurisdictions, provide an overview of the services negotiations under the CFTA.

Starting today, in Addis: Third meeting of the Continental Free Trade Area Negotiating Forum: The main objective of the third meeting of the CFTA Negotiating Forum is to consider and adopt Terms of Reference for the remaining technical working groups; and to consider and adopt the modalities for the CFTA negotiations in trade in goods and trade in services. The main expected results are therefore adopted ToRs for the remaining technical working groups (on rules of origin, sanitary and phytosanitary measures, trade remedies and customs procedures and trade facilitation) as well as an adopted modalities for the CFTA negotiations in trade in goods and trade in services.

Southern Africa: How does an illegal gold miner get money across the border? (GroundUp)

“Our money transfers are unregistered in South Africa. They are built on simple cellular phone technology and cross-border trust,” explains a dealer, who operates from Springs. “Our customers are dozens of immigrants with no passports – irregular gold miners and foreign girls working in Johannesburg beauty salons. We think our fees are 50% lower than the likes of Western Union. Receivers, across the borders, in Zimbabwe and Mozambique, get paid in goats, cattle or dollars.” He is one of a set of cross-border entrepreneurs that has arisen in the wake of the flow of immigrants from neighbouring countries to South Africa’s informal gold mining towns like Springs, 50 km from Johannesburg, and to the giant farms in Limpopo where Zimbabwean and Mozambican immigrants pick fruit He explains how the cross-border informal money transfers work, entirely built on trust. “The hard-living foreign gold miners, called Ma Gweja, surrender their earnings to us, the carefully vetted Gweja cross-border money transfers agents. We are their countrymen after all,” says Miyambo.

Botswana’s Letshego drives financial inclusion in Mozambique (Mmegi)

Letshego Holdings Limited continues to make great strides in delivering on its mandate to ensure simple, affordable and appropriate financial solutions across Africa. Mozambique, a key market for the group, remains central to this, as evidenced by the launch of the Letshego “BlueBox”, which will be a unique proposition of the agency banking model of the business. Banco Letshego comprises 12 branches across all provinces in the country and serving over 60,000 customers through a hub and spoke model.

Note: the Second East Africa Microfinance Summit will take place in Dar es Salaam, 2-4 November

Standard Chartered launches ‘Banking the ecosystem’ strategy to support global trade

Multinational corporations have built their businesses around sophisticated supply chains to achieve stable production volumes on one hand, and robust sales and distribution channels on the other. These supply chains have become increasingly complex over recent years as production opportunities in lower cost economies of Southeast Asia and Africa emerge and patterns of global demand evolve. As supply chains evolve, so do the banking services that companies require to mitigate risk, maintain liquidity across the supply chain and facilitate growth. This report, commissioned by Standard Chartered Bank, considers how supply chains are changing, based on the experience of sample industries, and features direct insights from treasurers on the implications of these changes.

Participation in global value chains in Latin America: implications for trade and trade-related policy (pdf, Working Party of the Trade Committee, OECD)

Latin America has a dense web of intra and extra-regional preferential trade agreements. In principle, this means that much of trade faces low border barriers. Nevertheless, the overlap, duplication and conflicts among the different rules and standards governing trade under these PTAs are likely reducing the benefits of these agreements. This is prompting renewed interest in the idea of linking or harmonising the various Latin American PTAs. To help inform this debate, this study analyses the impact of rules of origin and non-tariff measures on GVC integration in the region, and examines relevant harmonisation initiatives.

East African trade policy dynamics, perspectives:

Region urged to expedite anti-counterfeit law (New Times): EAC member states should hasten the finalisation and enactment of the EAC Anti-Counterfeit Law in order to establish a regional framework to fight counterfeits, stakeholders have recommended. This was raised at the end of the second regional anti-illicit trade conference in Nairobi, Kenya, recently which was organised by the East African Business Council, in partnership with the EAC Secretariat. Patricia Hajabakiga, a member of East Africa Legislative Assembly Committee on Communication, Trade and Investment, said the EAC Anti-Counterfeit Bill was still with the Council. “It has been there for a long time. It is a big problem since the Customs Management Act cannot adequately deal with the magnitude of the problem. It was in the past tabled in the House but was withdrawn by the Council to make it more comprehensive,” the legislator said.

New EAC rules of origin ‘will spur regional manufacturing industry’ (New Times): Different stakeholders were speaking during the 7th session between the Ministry of East African Community and the Rwandan private sector, last week. The meeting sought to learn from the private sector’s experience on the implementation of the revised EAC Rules of Origin, and to share updates ahead of another meeting later this month that is envisaged to carry out a comprehensive review of Common External Tariff. Fred Nuwagaba, a senior customs officer at Rwanda Revenue Authority, warned the business community that, recently, there have been problems with people from some EAC member states who export cooking oil to Rwanda after only purifying and packaging crude oil commonly imported from Asia, a practice he said does not qualify for the preferential treatment under the new rules of origin.

Rwanda: New committee to facilitate trade (New Times): The National Trade Facilitation Committee, to be headed by the Ministry of Trade and Industry, was announced at a meeting in Kigal. The committee brings together the private sector, civil society and public sector representatives as well as trade-related service suppliers to discuss issues of trade and trade related policies and agree on better approaches to reform and improve. The committee will be deputised by the Rwanda Revenue Authority as a key implementing agency. It was inaugurated following a three-day training and awareness workshop of the members held in Kigali that sought to build its capacity to ensure all members are well equipped to deal with the assigned responsibilities and deliver on the expected results.

Uganda, Kenya in spat over beef, sugar (The East African): Uganda and Kenya are both being accused of trade protectionism, with Kampala denying market access to Kenya’s beef and Nairobi restricting the amount of sugar imports from Uganda. Ugandan authorities are reluctant to lift the ban on Kenyan beef because the matter is still a “very sensitive one.” The East African has established that politics rather than technical concerns is at the centre of the Uganda-Kenya beef and sugar talks. Kenyan beef traders have been out of the Ugandan market for over 15 years. [Now Kenya makes plans to produce industrial sugar]

South Africa: August 2016 merchandise trade statistics (SARS)

The R8.56bn trade balance deficit for August 2016 is attributable to exports of R90.24bn and imports of R98.80bn. Exports for the year-to-date grew by 9.0% from R679.27bn to R740.70 billion. Imports for the year-to-date of R733.29bn are 2.6% more than the imports recorded in January to August 2015 of R714.37bn. The world zone results from July 2016 (revised) to August 2016 are:

Namibia: Second Quarter Bulletin (pdf, BoN)

Merchandise trade balance: During the second quarter of 2016, the merchandise trade deficit declined on an annual basis, due to an increase in the value of merchandise exports, coupled with a reduction in import payments, while it deteriorated, quarter-on-quarter. The trade deficit declined significantly, year-on-year, by 32.1% to N$8.4bn (Table 5.1). This decline was mainly supported by increased export earnings, which rose by 8.3% to N$13.7bn, combined with a drop in the import bill. In this regard, imports fell by 11.6% to N$22.1bn, reinforcing the improvement of the deficit in the trade balance. On the exports front, earnings from uranium, manufactured products and re-exports contributed to the increase in exports. At the same time, the decline in import payments were attributed to a reduction in expenditure on major import categories, such as fuels, vehicles, aircrafts and vessels. Conversely, the trade deficit widened noticeably by 44.0%, on a quarterly basis, mainly due to a decline in export receipts relative to the growth in the import bill.

Zimbabwe: National Competitiveness Commission Bill gazetted (The Chronicle)

The Government has gazetted the National Competitiveness Commission Bill as it moves to expedite the creation of an efficient and cost-effective business operating environment, an official has said. The development fundamentally paves way for the repeal of the National Incomes and Pricing Act Chapter 14:32 and operationalisation of the NCC. The NCC’s role - among others- is to co-ordinate government policy related to the business sector.

Mozambique may solve current crisis by selling gas in advance (Club of Mozambique)

Mozambique’s Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade, Rajendra de Sousa, believes that Mozambique can can solve its current debt crisis through advance sales of natural gas. Interviewed by the Portuguese daily “Publico”, Sousa said the crisis is structural, but made worse by the public debt. This debt soared by some 20% with the government guarantees granted in 2013-2014 for over $2bn worth of loans contracted by three quasi-public companies. But Sousa was confident that this debt could be swiftly cleared by sales in advance of the huge gas reserves discovered in the Rovuma Basin, off the coast of the northern province of Cabo Delgado. The gas discoveries have been made in blocks where the operators are the Texas-based company Anadarko, and the Italian energy company ENI. But so far all the gas remains at the bottom of the sea – neither Anadarko nor ENI have yet made their final investment decision, on which will depend the billions of dollars required to build the factories making liquefied natural gas.

West African corridors: studies highlight improved performance, need for short term high impact projects to consolidate gains (AfDB)

The study, conducted in four countries – Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Togo, Burkina Faso – along the Abidjan-Ouagadougou corridors; Tema-Ouagadougou; Lomé-Ouagadougou, found that all three corridors have seen improvements in both costs and time. The average corridor costs have gone down by 16% and average corridor times by 6% over the last 4 to 8 years. In terms of cost distribution, the survey indicated that trucking costs absorb about 65% of the total corridor transport costs; ports take 20% while border crossings and clearance at the inland terminal account for about 15% of the total corridor costs for import. The study found that export is generally less expensive and faster than import. Other indicators were also shared such as process and travel time to move goods along the corridors and rail versus road indicators. [Download the draft reports, conducted by SAANA, here]

Deepening regional integration in Africa: maximizing the utilization of AGOA in ECOWAS (Wilson Centre)

In answering the above questions, it is crucial for the U.S. government to continue expanding on its strategy and trade capacity-building in Africa. The most important need is assistance in deepening regional integration in ECOWAS (and other RECS), particularly in harmonizing the processes of the Free Trade agreement and especially the removal of tariffs on industrial products. Moreover, it is essential that African governments establish effective dialogue with the private sector, civil society, and policymakers to chart new and robust ways to be relevant in the new trade policy environment. [The analyst: George Boateng] [For the full set of policy options and recommendations, see the companion Policy Brief]

Selected highlights from the WTO Public Forum 2016:

How and why to rethink data flow restrictions (ICC): In a new set of recommendations issued at the WTO Public Forum, ICC calls on policymakers to consider the detrimental effects to GDP growth from applying blanket restrictions and highlights the importance of creating trusted environments to better enable use of information and communication technologies, and related data flows, on which companies of all sizes rely. To help policymakers address negative implications for growth from blanket restrictions to data flows, the new ICC primer outlines seven steps that governments can take to ensure citizens and companies realise the full potential of the Internet as a platform for innovation and economic growth. The recommendations are: [Trade in the digital economy: a ICC primer on global data flows for policymakers (pdf)]

Related: MSMEs and e-commerce: preliminary report (pdf, WTO Business Focus Group 1); Digital customs for improved border management and e-commerce opportunities: roundtable at WTO Public Forum 2016

The gender dimensions of services (ICTSD)

This paper provides an in-depth analysis of the gender-based constraints faced by women in accessing employment and business opportunities in trade in services, and the wider service sector. Additionally, the paper offers a set of policies that support equal access to the benefits of services growth for both genders, and create an inclusive policy and regulatory environment that reduces the gender-based constraints faced by women wage-workers and entrepreneurs in the services sector. [The analysts: Julia Lipowiecka, Tabitha Kiriti-Nganga]

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