The implementation of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) in Eastern Africa could result in welfare gains amounting to USD 1.8 billion for East Africa, boosting intra-African exports by more than USD 1.1 billion and creating more than 2 million new jobs, says a new report. This report, entitled: “Creating a Unified Regional Market - Towards the Implementation of The African Continental Free Trade Area in East Africa” jointly published by the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and Trademark East Africa, was launched in Nairobi, Kenya. Betty Maina, Kenya’s minister for trade and industrialisation, explained that her country pursues growth in trade by identifying different markets to its products. She stressed that to maximise benefits from the AfCFTA, greater attention must be geared towards supply chains in agricultural commodities and processed food products to scale it up to the continental level. “We need to up our game and I am glad that large numbers of young people enter the food processing industry, which provides a lot of jobs for our youth”, she said. Stephen Karingi, Director Regional Integration and Trade Division at the ECA, who also attended the event, said that by 2040 the AfCFTA has the potential to increase the value of agricultural and food exports on the continent by US$16.8 billion. Karingi noted that according to recent estimates by ECA, the largest percentage increases - that is over 25 per cent in intra-African exports for industrial sectors - are found in textile, wearing apparel, leather, wood...

ADDIS ABABA, March 9 (Xinhua) -- Effective implementation of the African Continental Free Trade Area Agreement (AfCFTA) could result in welfare gains amounting to 1.8 billion U.S. dollars for East African economies, while boosting intra-African exports by more than 1.1 billion U.S. dollars and creating more than 2 million new jobs, according to a new United Nations report. The newly published report, entitled "Creating a Unified Regional Market, Towards the Implementation of AfCFTA in East Africa" and jointly published by the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and Trademark East Africa over the weekend, provided a first comprehensive assessment of the potential impact of the continental free trade deal on the East African economies. The report, which discusses the measures and supportive instruments that will be needed towards the success of the AfCFTA, mainly analyzed existing patterns of intra-regional trade and investment as well as the opportunities created by access to more open domestic and regional markets under the free trade pact. According to the report, the elimination of tariffs and non-tariff barriers required by the AfCFTA "will boost intra-African trade and improve developmental prospects for East Africa, allowing regional firms to tap into the rapidly growing markets both within the region and throughout Africa." It, however, stressed that many of the expected gains could be undermined if the needs and concerns of the private sector are not heard in order to gain an understanding of the impact on the affected sectors. The report also noted that establishing regular platforms...

ADDIS ABEBA – The implementation of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) in Eastern Africa could result in welfare gain amounting to USD 1.8 billion for East Africa, a new report says. It could also boost intra-African exports by more than USD 1.1 billion and creating more than 2 million new jobs, says report jointly published by the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and Trademark East Africa. Stephen Karingi, Director Regional Integration and Trade Division at the ECA, said that by 2040 the AfCFTA has the potential to increase the value of agricultural and food exports on the continent by US$16.8 billion. Largest percentage increases – that is over 25 per cent in intra-African exports for industrial sectors – are found in textile, wearing apparel, leather, wood and paper, vehicle and transport, agro-foods such milk and dairy products, sugar, beverages, vegetables, fruit, nuts and rice, according to ECA’s recent estimates. Boosts to intra-African trade According to the report, the elimination of tariffs and non-tariff barriers required by the Agreement will boost intra-African trade and improve developmental prospects for East Africa, allowing regional firms to tap into the rapidly growing markets both within the region and throughout Africa. However, the report stresses that many of the expected gains could be undermined if the needs and concerns of the private sector are not heard in order to gain an understanding of the impact on the affected sectors This requires an understanding of needs at all levels including large, small and...

Local regulators have for long grappled with firms that have grown too big for oversight and whose success has at times been detrimental to consumers. Some have tended to abuse their dominance by locking out new entrants while dictating prices and other industry issues for consumers who do not have alternatives.Cartels, too, some aided by monopolies and government agencies, have proved a hard nut to crack for regulators, not just locally but regionally.A recent study by the World Bank blamed the cartels and monopolistic behaviour by large firms dealing in food as being directly responsible for keeping more than 270,000 people in absolute poverty. This is just one industry, and the numbers could rise sharply when anti-competitive behaviour is evaluated in other sectors. Opening markets Successful implementation of the Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) could deal a major blow to the cartels and monopolies that have resisted regulators in the past, according to a report by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (Uneca) and TradeMark Africa (TMA). The report notes that AfCFTA’s opening up of markets will enable other firms from across the borders to bring in formidable competition to monopolies or duopolies that have a firm hold on East Africa’s economies.The report published last week noted that East Africans stand to be major beneficiaries of the break-up of anti-competitive behaviour perfected by local firms and multinationals. Such firms, it noted, have had a stranglehold on key industries and markets to the extent that they solely determine prices...

IOTA Foundation, a non-profit foundation focused on distributed ledger technology (DLT) and open-source ecosystem development, announced today a partnership with TradeMark Africa (TMA). The goal of the partnership is to help TMA in its mission to improve East African trade and global competitiveness using IOTA’s distributed ledger technology. TMA works closely with the East African community institutions, national governments, the private sector and civil society organizations to increase trade by reducing current barriers and by improving business competitiveness. Currently, Africa has vast, unlocked potential that has not yet been realized, due to its lack of physical and digital trading infrastructure. This greatly affects the economic prosperity of the continent. TMA’s goal is to increase trade by improving the trade system in East Africa, leading to an enhanced economy and a reduction in poverty, particularly in sectors and geographic areas that depend on international trade. In order to take advantage of trade opportunities, the private sector in Eastern Africa must produce safe and competitive goods on time for its customers. “It is key to us that introducing new technologies is not a lock-in but puts the control into the hands of the government and the traders. Public infrastructure must avoid any potential to monopolize the control or the data with a few private actors - and give value to all actors independent of size. This partnership provides us access to a technology where we can test the value of decentralized data management and have control mechanisms of the underlying infrastructure. Equally...

Africa took a giant stride along the path of increased economic co-operation, with the launch of the Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) in March 2018. The move was widely hailed as a major milestone towards the long-standing goal of creating a unified continental market. AfCFTA is hailed as one of the most exciting new developments on the continent, with the potential to connect African countries from the Atlantic to the Indian Ocean, and from Cape Town to Cairo. By liberalising trade, AfCFTA will help countries grow economies and create jobs. If fully implemented, AfCFTA would see the creation of the world’s largest free trade area since inauguration of the World Trade Organisation in 1995, boasting a domestic market of more than 1.2 billion people, and a collective gross domestic product of $2.6 trillion. Effective implementation of AfCFTA would be transformational. The African Development Bank has forecast that elimination of bilateral tariffs on goods and services would increase intra-African trade by 15 per cent. Yet significant barriers remain beyond tariffs. Without a focus on implementation, we could see a trade agreement that is largely unusable. Many African countries are members of several regional economic communities — the East African Community, the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa, the Southern African Development Community and the Economic Community of West African States — applying different rules of origin, trading standards and cross-border procedures, all making it costly to trade. The World Bank Doing Business report for 2020 shows that while it...

he purpose of national economic reform is to change the structure and overall direction of an economy. Reforms therefore can affect the amount of resources available to a country. They can also affect human rights. South Africa desperately needs to reform its economy. Its capacity to deal with its tragic problems of unemployment, poverty and inequality is diminishing. State owned enterprises like the power utility Eskom, public transport group Prasa and South Africa Airways, are failing to deliver adequate services. They are also draining public resources away from more productive and socially beneficial purposes. And the country’s economy is too carbon intensive. It needs to transition to less carbon intensive forms of production and consumption. The South African government’s proposed responses to these challenges are controversial. They involve job losses and cuts in social services. Government claims that over time the reforms will yield more jobs, better services and a growing economy that is environmentally sustainable. Unfortunately, while the short term costs are clear, the long term benefits are uncertain. Even if they arrive, they may not benefit the groups bearing the short term losses. The same is true about the alternatives. For example, the mining sector’s efforts to protect the coal industry may preserve jobs but at the cost of the long term health of children. Efforts by trade union to preserve wages for public sector workers may mean fewer jobs in the public sector for today’s students and learners. In short, all these options may produce substantial benefits....

President Yoweri Museveni has said Uganda is still a good investment destination because of its conducive investment environment. The president in a written speech read by the Prime Minister Ruhakana Rugunda at the official opening of the first Uganda-European Union business Forum at Speke Resort Munyonyo on Monday urged investors from European Union states to invest in specific areas like agricultural irrigation. “Uganda in partnership with development Partners including the European Union has made significant strides in laying a firm foundation for investments, industrialization and international trade. The road network has been greatly improved and one can travel from one border to another on tarmac only.  We are also working on rehabilitating the railway and advancing preparations for construction of the Standard Gauge Railway,” he stated. He added, “Hydro-Electric Power generation has increased significantly, currently close to  1,200MW. Government and in some cases the private sector, has also set up and continues to set up Industrial Parks. On the regulatory side, we have been steadfast in easing the process of investing and doing business in Uganda. A One Stop Investment  Centre has been set up at the Uganda Investment Authority to ease the investment process while several One Stop Border Posts have also been established to facilitate international trade”. The 2-day Forum that is being attended by over 1500 delegates from EU states, government officials, members of the Ugandan private sector and development partners is organized as a joint effort between the European Union Government of Uganda represented by the...

Uganda National Roads Authority (UNRA) has said the ongoing construction of the Northern Bypass which has stalled for several years will be completed by October next year. Construction of the second phase of the Kampala Northern Bypass commenced in July 2014 with an originally expected completion date of July 2017. However, numerous delays have since seen this date pushed ahead. The physical progress as at end of February 2020 was at 70% and the contractor is fully mobilized towards completion of the project by October 2021, UNRA said in a statement on Thursday.  However, the roads agency says sections that are being substantially completed and deemed safe, will be progressively delivered to traffic before the end date, as is already the case with the main section between Busega to Hoima, including the Sentema and Hoima interchanges and the three foot bridges at Kyebando, Ntinda and Naalya.  Land acquisition, design improvements are among the issues to which the construction delays have been attributed. Disputed compensation amounts by Project Affected Persons (PAPs), family disputes over land ownership, absentee landlords caused challenges in the compensation process. Design changes Regarding design, UNRA says there were “changes necessary for the proper completion and functioning of the road”. Among these was; additional drainage structures which were incorporated into the project based on a hydrological study undertaken such as the high capacity drains at Kyebando and upgrading Sentema junction from a widened roundabout to a grade separated interchange to ensure future free flow of traffic on the...

The markets are being constructed by Amudat District local government with support from Mercy Corps, Development Initiative for Northern Uganda (DINU) and government of Uganda, through the Resilience Project. In February 2019, the government unveiled a plan to construct a livestock market in Alakas in Amudat Sub-county to promote trade and animal health in the district and neighbouring Kenya at undisclosed amount of money. At the same time, the district local government is constructing another cross border market in Karita close to the Kenyan border to enhance livestock trade and improve revenue. The facility is worth 600 million shillings. Richard Lomong of Karita Sub-county where the biggest market is under completion says the facility will increase business opportunities in the area and improve their earnings. He says that the market presents an opportunity for Uganda and Kenya to do cross border trade and therefore encourage peace at the border. Wamai Omar a resident of Alakas in Amudat district is happy that government is now focusing on enhancing trade. He says that the youth in the area will engage in livestock selling and eventually address the problem of unemployment. “Most of the youths did not go to school. They are doing petty businesses. We hope when these markets open, the youths will tap the funds given to them under the Youth Livelihood project to engage in livestock trade, said Omar recently through a translator. Wasswa Masokoyi, the CAO Amudat told URN that Karita market facility will comprise of a children’s play...