President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi stressed the importance of benefiting from three trade agreements signed with African countries topped by the agreement reached recently in Sharm El-Sheikh between the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA), the East African Community (EAC) and the Southern African Development community (SADC). During a meeting on Monday 10/8/2015 with a delegation representing newspapers in some African countries, the President said he has been keen since coming to office on openness to Africa and boosting ties with African countries. Presidential Spokesman Alaa Youssef said the President welcomed the African journalists during the meeting, which came days after the inauguration of the New Suez Canal project. He said the President affirmed the new project is in parallel with the efforts to boost transport movement, including the project of linking Lake Victoria to the Mediterranean. The President discussed with African journalists aspects of cooperation between Egypt and African countries, pointing out that such cooperation is not limited to technical support to them but also extended to important partnerships, added the spokesman. He said the President pointed out that the cancer hospital in Egypt received 600 medics from the Nile basin countries who received training during the past three years. Sisi stressed the importance of cooperation in the fields of combating terrorism and said the terror combat must not be limited to security, but rather must be through economic and social issues. The President said the State respects and appreciates the role of media and did not put...

The Eastern Africa Grain Council (EAGC) in partnership with FoodTrade Eastern and Southern Africa has launched the G-Soko Platform. This is an online trading service that links smallholder farmers to grain buyers through a networked and structured market mechanism. Gerald Masila, the Executive Director of EAGC said recently in Nairobi, “Right now there is urgency to expand regional food trade due to the exponential growth of staple food imports. “Linking rural food surplus production zones in Eastern Africa to major deficit urban consumption centres requires a well-functioning regional market. We wanted to address this deficiency but also do it in a way that is inclusive and effective. This is why we developed G-Soko; a market transaction platform that will enhance food trade across borders, and contribute towards making trading more transparent,” Masila said. According to a release, the platform will allow farmers to easily sell their products at a favourable prices and this should help stabilise the food supply chain in East Africa because of guaranteed market access. The G-Soko platform was developed by Virtual City, a leading mobile software solutions firm supporting the supply chain and agribusiness industry in Africa. Virtual City Managing Director, John Waibochi said, “The model addresses the challenge of funds inadequacy by devising affordable export/import financing modalities. It creates synergies from the small scale farmers to the bulk buyers based on tested market structures.” He said, “This system also enhances traceability of grains. Its Grain Bulking feature allows farmers to consolidate and sell their grains...

Egypt’s Ministry of Industry and Foreign Trade is looking to double its exports of agricultural crops and is looking to African markets to realise this goal. Through free trade agreements with Nigeria and Senegal (with more between West and Central Africa on the way) the North African nation is seeking to trade with notable African markets such as the International Maritime Organisation (IMO), and the Economic and Monetary Community of Central Africa (CEMAC). Egypt’s Minister of Industry and Foreign Trade, Mounir Fakhry Abdel Nour, highlighted that Egypt had already reached a preliminary agreement with IMO in 2004. After negotiations were halted, the ministry is now seeking to reach a final agreement through the current negotiations. Abdel Nour added that the volume of African total product amounts to $2.5 trillion, that annual exports amounts to about $599.5 billion and that total annual imports are worth $605 billion. However, Egypt’s share of these amounts is no more than $4 billion. Egypt is developing its trade relations with the rest of the continent based on three approaches: Re-forming Egypt’s mutual interests with other African countries, moving from merely water-based interests to achieving broader economic outcomes Strengthening Egypt’s presence in African markets by leveraging its commodities; the ministry seeks to transform the country into a major supplier of goods to needy African countries Increase the size of the technical assistance provided by Egypt which assist with social and economic development.   Abdel Nour said: “The ministry implemented important steps to strengthen cooperation with Africa,...

Kenya's President Uhuru Kenyatta has urged the East African region to harness its "shared identities" as the strongest asset to develop its economy. Addressing the Ugandan Parliament in Kampala on Monday, President Kenyatta said the close ties between the people of Kenya and Uganda should encourage similar policies that would guide the region out of poverty. "It is such shared identities and people-to-people links that tie our partnership. We will need these links more than before in future," he told Ugandan MPs. Mr Kenyatta, who was on his first ever state visit to Uganda since his election, used the podium to challenge the region to reorganise policies if they have to catch up with the 'Asian Tigers'- the emerging economies of the Far East. These 'Tigers' include Malaysia and Singapore, "countries who have managed to move from wretched poverty to great wealth in just two generations." Of concern to him is corruption and poor governance, which he argued were eating into any progress the two countries make. Standard gauge railway Both Uganda and Kenya belong to the East African Community, which also includes Rwanda, Burundi and Tanzania. The region has been involved in key infrastructure projects such as the multibillion-dollar standard gauge railway, improving the Port of Mombasa and reducing road blocks on goods in transit. But President Kenyatta admitted there are "enemies" who may want to stand in the way of these projects. He never named them, but hinted at corrupt officials and political detractors who he argued posed...

EAST African Community countries need to engage the private sector when formulating business laws and regulations to accelerate integration under the bloc's common market protocol, President Uhuru Kenyatta has said. He said such consultations will help better the region's business environment, helping firms thrive and spark faster economic growth. Speaking during a business forum on his three-day state visit to west-neighbouring Uganda that ends today, Uhuru however emphasised that companies need to become more innovative and competitive to remain relevant in a highly globalising market. The president held bilateral talks with his host, President Yoweri Museveni on Saturday, focusing on security, anti-terrorism, trade and investment. In a statement to newsrooms yesterday, the Presidential Strategic Communications Unit said the two countries are working on a framework to forge increased collaboration of companies. This will hel;p take advantage of the proposed 700-million people tripartite market bringing together EAC, Comesa and Southern Africa Development Community 26 member countries. The framework will be coordinated by the Kenya National Chamber of Commerce and its counterpart in Uganda, guided by a memorandum of understanding that the two have signed. Uganda remain's Kenya's largest trading partners with trade volumes of Sh88.88 billion ($880 million) last year, including Sh70.7 billion($700 million) in exports and Sh18.18 billiin in imports($180 million) in imports. “Last year, in keeping with our recent history, the volume of trade between us made Uganda one of Kenya’s most vital trading partners,” Museveni said. Source: The Star

EAST African Community may have a common custom bond in two weeks as the bloc races to enhance faster movement of goods across the five member countries, the Kenya Revenue Authority has said. This is part of the proposed Regional Customs Transit Guarantee, a regime that will ensure authorities in a transit country receive proper payment for dues and duties for goods passing through their territories. The RCTG bonds scheme is designed to fast-track movement of goods under the customs seals. Value of custom bonds presently vary from one country to another because of different duty rates and valuation of goods. “This(RCTG) will put in place a mechanism which the importing country can recover revenue in case of an incidence," KRA commissioner general John Njiraini said. "Once that is completed in one or two weeks, we will now be rolling out further products that will then be secured through this system.” The RCTG was first introduced in 2012 for three countries along Northern corridor – Kenya, Uganda and Rwanda – to facilitate movement of goods from the port of Mombasa to the hinterland. Tanzania joined joined on April 9, this year. Introduction of uniform bonds for the EAC countries is part of the ongoing implementation of the Single Customs Territory system which was launched in October 2013. The SCT allows for assessment and collection of taxes at the port of entry. Its implementation which is in phases is currently at 50 per cent, according to the EAC secretariat. KRA said...

NAIROBI (Xinhua) -- The East African Community (EAC) Member States are fine tuning modalities of setting up a single customs regime in order to promote cross border trade, have officials. Heads of revenue authorities from Burundi, Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda and Uganda, who met in Nairobi, said that countries have been harmonizing policy and legislative frameworks to fast-track the establishment of a single customs territory (SCT). "The process of establishing a single customs territory in the region has not encountered any hitches and would be completed in three years time," Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) Commissioner General John Njiraini said in Nairobi. East African Heads of States have approved the uniform customs regime to ease cross border movement of goods and services The regional countries in 2012 commenced the process of establishing a single customs territory as a means to boost cross border trade, revenue collection and ease of doing business. The EAC is targeting the creation of a political federation, a borderless single state made up of the five countries, Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Uganda and Tanzania, led by a single president and exercising a single foreign policy. To get the vision of a single state in motion, the Arusha-based EAC Secretariat has been working towards a foreign policy, a common defence policy, a customs union, which is currently in place and the Monetary Union, which aims at a single currency. Njiraini noted that significant ground has been covered since the process of establishing a regional customs regime commenced. "We have covered...

NAIROBI, Kenya, Aug 7 – East African nations are integrating their customs systems to make it possible to have a regional bond for goods in transit. Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) Commissioner General John Njiraini says the bonds scheme is designed to fast-track movement of goods under customs seals in the East Africa region. Value of customs bonds vary from country to country because of different duty rates and valuation of goods. In Kenya, the current procedure requires importers of transit goods to secure a customs bond issued by an insurance company, whilst ‘sensitive’ cargo such as clothes, wines and spirits, tyres and tubes, shoes, electronic goods, second-hand clothes, food commodities (sugar and rice) require a bank or cash guarantee. The customs bond in Uganda is issued by an insurance company and is cancelled upon presentation of a copy CD-COM duly stamped by customs officers of the post of exit. Rwanda also requires a bond in cash. “The adoption of common external tariffs and the introduction of a regional bond guarantee scheme should solve this problem,” said Njiraini during a regional meeting in Nairobi that discussed the implementation of the EAC Single Customs Territory (SCT) projects. The meeting comes ahead of the forthcoming 11th Northern Corridor Integration Projects Summit, to be held in Nairobi. The one day meeting brought together the Commissioners General of Revenue Authorities from Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, Tanzania, Burundi and Democratic Republic of Congo to discuss cargo clearance time and costs. The commissioners discussed the implementation of the...

The launch of the Tripartite Free Trade Area (TFTA) by 26 African countries at the beginning of June brings together the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA), the Southern African Development Community (SADC) and the East African Community (EAC) and is in line with the long-standing vision of creating an African Economic Union. It is expected that the TFTA will be a building block towards establishing the Continental Free Trade Area by 2017. The TFTA represents a consumer market of about 600 million people and about 58 percent of the continent’s Gross Domestic Product, estimated at US$1.3 trillion. However, Minister of Industrialisation, Trade and SME Development, Immanuel Ngatjizeko, yesterday warned that Namibia needs to increase its industrial capacity to take advantage of the opportunities provided by the TFTA. “Namibia in particular places industrialisation at the centre of its development strategy, hence the need to expand our industrial base is more important now than ever,” said Ngatjizeko during a public seminar on regional and continental economic integration arrangements. He added that his ministry is ready to work with the private sector and Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) to ensure that the country’s industrial strategy yields results. Ngatjizeko added that policymakers have realised that market liberalisation alone without industrialisation and infrastructure development does not serve the economic purpose, especially in countries like Namibia whose industrial capacity is constrained and not as competitive as other countries. He said for this reason the TFTA emphasises industrialisation and infrastructure development as strategic pillars...

Barack Obama has called for an increase in intra-African trade alongside a renewed economic engagement with the United States, arguing that countries on the continent can do much more to build links with neighbouring states. "The biggest markets for your goods are often right next door. You don't have to just look overseas for growth, you can look internally... it shouldn't be harder for African countries to trade with each other than it is for you to trade with Europe and America," he said. Obama was delivering a keynote speech to the African Union in Addis Ababa, the first sitting US president to address the body since its foundation in 2001. The speech capped off a five-day trip to Kenya and Ethiopia. According to UN figures, the share of intra-African trade in Africa's total trade over the past decade was only about 11 per cent, compared to 70 per cent for Europe. In response, Obama said that the US would step up efforts to encourage regional integration, building on previous US assistance in modernizing customs and border crossings in the East African Community. The president also highlighted US efforts in battling corruption, tackling illicit capital flows and building power capacity on the continent. Obama praised African countries that have torn down barriers to investment, but argued that much more needs to be done to spark business growth on the continent. "In many places in Africa, it's still too hard to start a venture, still too hard to build a business,"...