AFRICAN FINANCE and trade ministers meeting in Kampala have called for the extension of an American trade initiative for the continent. The Africa Growth and Opportunities Act (AGOA) that gives select African countries some access to the American market, is due to expire, and would have to be renewed by the US Congress. AGOA is well and good, as is the European Union’s recent declaration of intent to stop subsidising farm exports, which would give African countries an opportunity to compete in the European market. But these two options are external — purely dependent on the largesse of the Europeans and the Americans. Africa would not be in control, and so we could just as easily find the rug pulled from under us if the conditions so given do not fit the EU’s and the US’s interests.
We should cast our net wider. Alongside exploiting AGOA and an unprotected farm produce market, extensive internal reforms should make us a much stronger trading partner in world trade.
China has done it. In spite of (initially) being outside of the World Trade Organisation, China reformed its economic system, focusing on industry and manufacturing, the proven engine of growth for developing economies. Today that, and other factors, have led to its being a big destination of foreign investment.
Africa needs to reform internally. Policies should be trade-oriented. Education and training should focus on how skills will feed into the overall trade strategy; ministries of trade need to be much bigger than the relatively insignificant government departments they are. At the government level, trade ministries should have linkages with all other ministries. Trade issues must be put at the centre of development strategies. Slowly but surely, then, we should see Africa’s share of world trade grow from the miserable 2.5% it is today.
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