World Trade Organisation Director-General Roberto Azevedo has described last December's ministerial conference in Nairobi as a memorable gathering where significant results were achieved. Mr Azevedo said the meeting delivered some of the biggest reforms in global trade policy ever realised in the past 20 years by the 162-member organisation. Speaking at the University of the West Indies in Jamaica, the WTO boss urged governments to capitalise on the progress in future negotiations that will enable governments and businesses to trade more. “The Nairobi package made a decision on export competition that was truly historic. It is the most important reform in international trade rules on agriculture since the creation of the WTO where we eliminated agricultural export subsidies. “This has significantly improved the global trading environment, especially in developing countries who suffered enormous trade-distorting potential from the subsidies. "In fact, this task has been outstanding since export subsidies were banned for industrial goods more than 50 years ago. So this decision corrected an historic imbalance,” he said. He said a level playing field in agricultural markets had been created, with direct benefits to farmers and exporters in developing and least-developed countries. Mr Azevedo said the move would also correct anomalies where export credits and state trading enterprises wrongly benefitted from the subsidies-driven export trade. “The smaller and the poorer the country, the more likely it is to need trade as a means to attract investments and to boost economic and social development. We simply cannot lose sight of this reality,”...

Djibouti has signed a series of trade agreements with China including the setting up banking and free trade zones, according to a statement from the strategic Horn of Africa nation’s president. China last month said it would build a naval base in Djibouti, the latest sign of China’s growing international security presence. The “important economic agreements” include banking deals and a proposed 48 square kilometre (18.5 square mile) free trade zone, with the first section “to be operational before the end of 2016”, President Ismail Omar Guelleh said in the statement released this week after the deal was inked on Monday. Djibouti, which lies at the entrance to the Red Sea and Suez Canal, will operate as a “trans-shipment and redistribution” hub for Beijing’s trade, the statement added. On Wednesday, the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) opened a “humanitarian logistics base” in Djibouti’s port. Regional WFP chief Valerie Guarnieri said the site will help aid to be transported more “quickly, efficiently and cost-effectively” in a region that includes neighbouring drought-hit Ethiopia, as well as war-torn Yemen, Somalia and South Sudan. WFP last year moved 500,000 tonnes of food through Djibouti and the new base will enable larger amounts. Floods and failed rains caused by the El Nino phenomenon have sparked a dramatic rise in the number of people going hungry in east Africa. WFP said aid for a quarter of all those they support worldwide will be funnelled through the new base. “We are opening this facility at a...

Nairobi — A regional conference for ports managers in eastern and southern Africa scheduled for next month in Dar es Salaam has been cancelled following a shake-up of the management of Tanzania Ports Authority (TPA) by President John Magufuli. The meeting was set for February 15-17 and was organised by the Ports Management Association of Eastern and Southern Africa (PMAESA) and TPA. "The conference was cancellation after newly elected Tanzania President John Magufuli relieved several TPA top managers, including the director-general, of their duties and dissolved the authority's board of directors," George Sunguh, the communication officer at PMAESA said. This will be the first time for the annual PMAESA conference not to take place since its inception in 2007 in Seychelles. Last year, President Magufuli sacked TPA director-general Awadhi Massawe and the permanent secretary in the Transport ministry, Mr Shaaban Mwinjaka, as part of a campaign to crack down on corruption and inefficiency in the country. They were shown the door following the disappearance of over 2,700 shipping containers at TPA. Mr Massawe, who was acting director of the port since February before being formally confirmed to the position in October by President Magufuli's predecessor, retired President Jakaya Kikwete, becomes the third TPA chief to be sacked in many years. "President Magufuli has also disbanded TPA's board of directors for failing to take action against the Dar es Salaam Port's long history of poor performance," the Prime Minister's Office said in a statement in December. President Magufuli has introduced economic...

TRANSPORT costs along the Northern Corridor have significantly dropped in the last three years making it the most efficient route in the East and Central Africa region, latest data show. According to the East Africa Logistics Survey 2015, the average cost of transporting a forty-foot container from Mombasa to Nairobi is down dropped to $1,000 (Sh102,360) last year from a high of $ 1,300 (Sh133,069) in 2011. Transport cost from Mombasa to Kampala came down to $2,500 (Sh255,901) from $3,400 (Sh348,026) over the same period. This is lower compared to the Central Corridor mainly served by the port of Dar-es-Salaam, where rates recorded a marginal increase, placing Mombasa as the cheapest entry point for goods into the region. Data by the Shippers Council of East Africa shows the cost of transport from Dar es Salaam to Kampala have increased from $2,507(Sh256,618) in 2011 to $4,500 (Sh460,623) in 2015. This has been coupled with low compliance at weighbridges, time taken at the data processing centres and cargo dwell time at the port. “The general drop in price can be attributed to a drop in fuel prices and also an increase in the supply of trucks, which lead to cut throat competition among the truckers. Northern Corridor is currently cheaper than the Central Corridor to various destinations in the East and Central African region,” the report released last week reads. The route with the highest rate of decline was Mombasa-Juba at 44 per cent, dropping from a high of $9,800 (Sh1.0 million)...

For several years, experts from the three largest trading blocs in Africa — the Southern African Development Community (SADC), the East African Community (EAC) and the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) — were locked in intense negotiations over a free trade agreement whose aim is to bring about a unified and liberalized single market. The talks finally bore fruit on 10 June 2015 when 26 African countries signed the Tripartite Free Trade Area (TFTA) agreement in Cairo, Egypt. Under this agreement, all the 26 countries, with a combined gross domestic product (GDP) of about $1.3 trillion and a population of 565 million, will merge into a common market and eliminate tariff lines and trade barriers. The participating countries will benefit from liberalized intra-regional trade, which is expected to boost the flow of goods and services. When implemented, the free trade area will constitute about half of Africa’s GDP, half of its population and will cover a combined landmass of 17 million square kilometres, about the size of Russia. At the moment, however, only three of Africa’s eight regional economic communities are participating in the TFTA. Non-participating economic blocs include the Arab Maghreb Union, the Economic Community of West African States, the Intergovernmental Authority on Development, the Economic Community of Central African States and the Community of Sahel-Saharan States. For now, these blocs are not participating in this new initiative for political and economic reasons. The Abuja Treaty of 1995 signed by 51 African countries mandates all regional...

The country will this year begin to automate trading at its weekly tea auction of regional produce to increase transparency in dealings, the chairman of the East African Tea Traders Association (EATTA), which runs the sale, said yesterday. Kenya's hosts the world's biggest tea auction, selling produce from nine African nations, including from Burundi, Rwanda, Uganda, Malawi and Mozambique. Ethiopia is due to join in March. The country, which is the world's top producer of black tea, earns about $1 billion a year from exports, according to EATTA, making it one of the nation's main sources of foreign exchange earnings. Complete automation of the auction would be completed in 2017 but the first phase would be in place this year, EATTA Chairman Nick Munyi said. "We are changing from the normal way of knocking the hammer to clicking the mouse," Munyi said by phone from the port city of Mombasa, where the 60-year old auction is based. Source: Standard Digital

NAIROBI Jan 20 (Reuters) - Kenya will this year begin to automate trading at its weekly tea auction of regional produce to increase transparency in dealings, the chairman of the East African Tea Traders Association (EATTA), which runs the sale, said on Wednesday. Kenya's hosts the world's biggest tea auction, selling produce from nine African nations, including from Burundi, Rwanda, Uganda, Malawi and Mozambique. Ethiopia is due to join in March. Kenya, the world's top producer of black tea, earns about $1 billion a year from exports, according to EATTA, making it one of the nation's main sources of foreign exchange earnings. Complete automation of the auction would be completed in 2017 but the first phase would be in place this year, EATTA Chairman Nick Munyi told Reuters. "We are changing from the normal way of knocking the hammer to clicking the mouse," Munyi said by phone from the port city of Mombasa, where the 60-year old auction is based. EATTA has 200 members drawn from growers, buyers, warehouse operators and brokers from regional African nations. Automating the auction would cost $1.3 million, Munyi said, adding it would be funded by Trade Mark East Africa, an organisation that supports trade in the region. Kenya's President Uhuru Kenyatta visited the auction on Tuesday and urged members to speed up automation. "Automating your system will go a long way to dispel some of the perceptions that this is a house of collusion. People believe that you just come here to showcase, but...

Shore handling charges at the key east Africa gateway ports of Mombasa and Dar es Salaam increased in 2015, while port dwell times for cargo continued to languish well below global standards. The charge for handling a 40 ft import container at the port of Mombasa, Kenya, rose from USD105 in 2014 to USD160 in 2015 and from USD90 to USD135 at Dar es Salaam in Tanzania. The charge for handling a 40 ft export container at Mombasa rose from USD56 in 2014 to USD80 in 2015, and fell from USD90 to USD20 at Dar es Salaam, figures released by the Shippers Council of Eastern Africa (SCEA) show. Charges for handling transit containers rose from USD85 to USD125 (import) and from USD40 to USD125 (export) at Mombasa, and from USD80 to USD95 (import) and from USD80 to USD210 (export) at Dar es Salaam. “Dar es Salaam has higher shore handling charges than Mombasa for transit exports of teus. However, Mombasa has higher rates for transit imports. Overall, there has been an increase in port charges between 2014 and 2015,” SCEA said in its annual Logistics Performance Survey. While charges increased, port dwell times remained poor and indicated a multitude of inefficiencies at both ports. For the purpose of the survey, port dwell time is defined as the time elapsed from when the cargo enters the port to when it leaves the port after all permits are obtained and all fees are paid. The survey said there was a 36.25% increase in port...

President Uhuru Kenyatta has asked players in the tea industry to respond to the needs and aspirations of farmers to avoid a situation where farmers give up and convert their farms into real estates and shopping malls. Speaking at the East Africa Tea Trade Association (EATTA) on Tuesday, the President said tea was such an important crop the country could not afford to lose. The President gave an example of coffee that most farmers had given up on, uprooting their crops and engaging in other activities. “We are living in an environment where farmers have options as what to do with their land and that would be a huge mistake if we were to say, because of pricing, prime agricultural or tea land was converted into apartments or shopping malls,” he said. Mr Kenyatta said the only way the industry would stop farmers from doing this was to ensure the farmer also benefitted from the proceeds of the crop, adding that his government would not want to see a situation where tea production declines due to farmer frustration. LOW TEA PRICES He recalled a crisis meeting he held with EATTA in 2014 when tea prices were low, saying that many farmers were on the verge of giving up on tea farming. “I don’t think this would serve you well neither does it serve the country because tea is one of our major export earner. “I also would appeal to you to be considerate of the farmer to see how we...

President Uhuru Kenyatta has asked players in the tea industry to respond to the needs of farmers to ensure that they do not abandon the cash crop and convert their farms into real estates. Speaking at the East Africa Tea Trade Association (EATTA) at the Coast on Tuesday, the President said tea was such an important crop that the country could not afford to lose. He gave an example of coffee, which he said most farmers had given up on and had resorted to uprooting their bushes and engaging in other economic activities. “We are living in an environment where farmers have options as what to do with their land and that would be a huge mistake if we were to say because of pricing, prime agricultural or tea land was converted into areas for construction of apartments or shopping malls,” Mr Kenyatta said. Kiambu County is one of the regions where farmers have been selling off their coffee farms to be converted into housing estates. Counties like Murang’a, Meru, Kirinyaga and Kiambu in the Mt Kenya region are among those that have been hit by the decline in coffee prices, prompting many farmers to abandon the crop. Exploitation has been blamed for the trend that has led to the crisis facing the brant sector. The only way the industry can stop farmers from doing this was to ensure they also benefitted from the proceeds of the crop, the President said, adding that his government would not want to see...