World Trade Organization
Eight WTO DG Candidates: Three Africans
Africa represents a key bloc within the WTO. It accounts for nearly 27% of membership and 35% of members from developing countries.
Dr. Amina Mohamed has the trade-policy heft. A Ukraine-educated lawyer with a postgraduate degree from Oxford, she was Kenya's ambassador to the WTO from 2000 to 2006 and held the prestigious job of chairwoman of the General Council. She then helped redraft Kenya's constitution and held a senior UN post before taking the job of Foreign Affairs and Trade Minister in 2013, serving for five years. Dr. Mohamed is now the Minister for Sports, Culture and Heritage. As the first African, she has chaired the WTO Ministerial Conference in Nairobi. Learn more about her achievements.
Mr. Abdel-Hamid Mamdouhm is an Egyptian lawyer, trade expert and a former WTO director, and now works for the law firm King & Spalding. He has 35 years of trade policy and diplomacy experience, and believes in the multilateral trading system (MTC) and its rule-based foundation. His previous positions in the GATT include: Assistant to the Deputy Director-General of the GATT and legal advisor on GATT dispute settlement. Mr. Mamdouhm was a negotiator for Egypt and then a senior WTO official. To learn more about his accomplishments
Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala is a US-educated economist who had 25-year career at the World Bank as a development economist,and rose to the No. 2 position at the World Bank, managing director of operations. She chairs Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance founded by Bill and Melinda Gates, and sits on the boards of Twitter and the British bank Standard Chartered. As a proponent of reforms and consensus builder amongst stakeholders, Dr. Okonjo-Iweala is the first woman to hold, for a combination of 7 years, Nigeria’s Finance Minister role from 2003-2006 and 2011-2015, and in 2006 Foreign Minister role. To learn more about her attainment.
Disunity threatens Africa’s shot at the world’s top trade job
The problem is that the WTO director general is chosen through grueling rounds of haggling to build consensus among some 160 WTO members, in which it helps to have a major regional block supporting a unified candidate. Both African representatives in Geneva and officials of the African Union have failed to back a single candidate. Read more
Published by Afrolehar in collaboration with Manchester Trade
"The positive economic stimulus and psychological impact of a critical mass of countries implementing the AfCFTA cannot be overestimated. No other step would provide the wherewith to spur African recovery from COVID-19 than the AfCFTA trade agreement being implemented in the next six to twelve months. It will spur the development of intra-African supply chains as a substitute for the expected reduction in demand for African components of global supply chains as third world countries strive for greater self-sufficiency." Read more.
US-Africa Engagement
U.S. International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) announced that it is launching the Africa Investment Advisor Program, which establishes a regional team based in Africa.
“The launch of this team at a time when many investors are skittish about emerging markets underscores DFC’s commitment to Africa,” said DFC Managing Director for Africa Worku Gachou. “Now more than ever Africa needs private sector investment. DFC continues to see significant opportunity on the continent and is eager to leverage its new regional footprint to unlock that potential.” Read more
Written Statement of Chris Maloney Acting Assistant Administrator, Bureau for Africa, before the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, and Global Human Rights
"The U.S. Government has provided close to $410 million to 45 countries across sub-Saharan Africa respond to the COVID-19 pandemic. The United States, through USAID, has shown a long-standing commitment to the African people. When former Administrator Mark Green last testified before this Committee, he spoke of USAID’s overarching mission of helping communities on their Journey to Self-Reliance. Our investments in global health throughout the decades are a cornerstone of this approach. The United States has committed more than $60 billion over the last 20 years to support public health on the African continent – by far the largest contribution of any donor nation." Read more
Prosper Africa Toolkit
For the first time ever, Prosper Africa brings together the resources of over 15 U.S. Government agencies to connect U.S. and African businesses with new buyers, suppliers, and investment opportunities. Read more
U.S.-Kenya Trade and Investment Relationship
A trade agreement between the United States and Kenya will complement Africa’s regional integration efforts, including the landmark African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA). In August 2019, the United States and African Union signed a joint statement concerning the development of the AfCFTA, which reflects our common goal to deepen trade and investment relationships across the continent. The United States pledges its continued support to help the AfCFTA achieve its fullest potential. Read more.
Interesting Articles
Kenya and Nigeria are leading Africa’s push to start taxing Silicon Valley’s global tech giants
Invariably, these efforts to introduce these taxes will likely win support from locally competitive players, as past evidence, and long-running sentiments, suggests. In the wake of Netflix going live across Africa, MultiChoice, the largest pay TV player across Africa, has been vocal about the need for the company to be regulated, bemoaning its operations as an over-the-top service without paying taxes, setting up a local presence or putting down infrastructure. (…) Telecoms companies across the continent have also pushed for messaging platforms including Facebook’s popular WhatsApp to be regulated because, they say, it undercuts their voice call and SMS revenue. And like in other parts of the world, Uber’s Africa operations have long faced pushback from local taxi groups who decry its model as anathema to their survival. Read more
The African Continental Free Trade Area
A tralac guide
To date (June 2019) trade data for only 17 African countries reflect 2018 figures. Between 2017 and 2018 South Africa’s intra-Africa exports increased by 7%, while exports by Nigeria, Egypt and Ghana increased by 41%, 30% and 26% respectively. South Africa’s intra-Africa imports increased by 35%, while im- ports by Zimbabwe, Ivory Coast, Egypt and Morocco show a similar increase. Intra-Africa imports by Zambia and Mauritius declined. Read more
AfCFTA could boost continent’s income by $450b – World Bank
“Tariff liberalization accompanied by a reduction in non-tariff barriers—such as quotas and rules of origin—would boost income by 2.4 percent, or about $153 billion. The remainder—$292 billion—would come from trade-facilitation measures that reduce red tape, lower compliance costs for businesses engaged in trade, and make it easier for African businesses to integrate into global supply chains,” the report said. (…) The AfCFTA, projected to serve Africa’s 1.2 billion people could also grow the continent’s GDP to $4.5 trillion. Read more
Two lessons from ASEAN for regional integration in Africa
The Flying Geese paradigm emphasizes the role of an advanced external partner (originally Japan) in the emergence and success of business-led regional integration in Southeast Asia. In 2000, the United States launched the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) while a year later, the European Union instituted the Everything But Arms (EBA) preference focusing on all least developed economies. Because of the sheer size of these markets, there were high expectations of the impact on trade and growth. With the rise of Asia as a major global market, exploring export opportunities in ASEAN+3 seems to be a sound move, allowing the various African regional economic communities to choose from three additional potential partners. Read more
NIH to invest $58M to catalyze data science and health research innovation in Africa
The program is targeting African academic and other non-profit organizations to apply in partnership with private sector, government and other research partners. Applications are due in late 2020 with projects slated to begin in September 2021. Read more
Ghana’s Finance Minister Says Global Investors Are Unfair to Africa
We were seeking some forbearance for three years in terms of debt servicing. We were also seeking over $100 billion to support the continent’s health infrastructure and another $100 billion for revitalization of African industries. The G-20 came up with the Debt Stand Still Initiative [DSSI], which most of the continent’s countries qualified for. Read more
Trade pact could boost Africa’s income by as much as $450 billion: World Bank
Most of AfCFTA’s income gains are likely to come by cutting red tape and simplifying customs procedures. The report explains that tariff liberalization accompanied by reducing non-tariff barriers would boost income by about $153 billion. The remaining $292 billion would result in measures such as lowering trade costs for businesses and facilitating African businesses to integrate into global supply chains. Read more
The US and Kenya launch negotiations on a free trade agreement. Will they succeed?
In an effort to derive more revenue from digital transactions, the government recently imposed two taxes: A 1.5 percent digital services tax, which will take effect on January 1, 2021 and an earlier withholding tax charged on “marketing, sales promotion and advertising services provided by non-resident persons.” American technology companies find these taxes discriminatory. Read more
Integrating technology for the new normal
“Today, it is all about the key message of Inspire Africa and growing business in partnership with one another. Everyone is in this situation together, and the only way to harness the new normal is by technology partners, vendors, suppliers, and customers to combine forces and leverage their respective expertise in more innovative ways,” says Alain Betrand Aka, System Engineer Lead at Westcon-Comstor Sub-Saharan Africa. Read more
