Trade minister Lucia Iipumbu has called for a tangible connection between the two-decades-old African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) and the relatively new kid on the block, the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).
This is to ensure easy access to the lucrative United States’ market.
“Namibia advocates the establishment of a nexus between AGOA and AfCFTA, as the combination of AGOA and AfCFTA is a game-changer in terms of increasing the size of the market for African countries, thereby creating an attractive environment for investment and allowing the continent to industrialise,” she said whilst addressing the ‘Invest in Namibia’ session of the 16th US-Africa Business Summit. The event took place in Texas earlier this month.
AGOA is a unilateral and non-reciprocal trade preference programme, which provides duty-free access into the US market for eligible products from eligible sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries.
The Trade Act has been in existence for two decades, and ha, since inception in May 2000 been amended half-a-dozen times. The current AGOA cycle stretches from July 2015 to September 2025, which is the longest extension in the history of the trade preference programme.
Some of the benefits Namibia received from AGOA is duty-free treatment for eligible products, tariff exception to increase competitiveness against products from non-AGOA countries, availability of AGOA-related trade capacity-building support from US agencies, potential for increased foreign direct investment (FDI), and export growth.
AfCFTA is the world’s largest free trade area, bringing together the 55 member countries of the African Union (AU) and eight regional economic communities (RECs).
Iipumbu said Namibia is also calling for the inclusive extension of AGOA to include AU member states which have signed and ratified the AfCFTA agreement.
“This is important, because AfCFTA allows for cumulation among African countries and regional value chains to form and enable better utilisation of AGOA,” she noted.
The objective of the 16th US-Africa Business Summit, to which Iipumbu led the Namibian team, was to enable leaders to connect with government and private sector decision-makers over the course of four days to drive US-Africa sustainable business partnerships.
“Competitiveness for Africa’s integration calls for front-loading digital capabilities which also support entrepreneurship. We are, therefore, advancing sector-focused policies and strategies mainstreaming the AfCFTA and addressing the capacity gap in the continent,” she stressed.
According to the Namibia Statistics Agency (NSA), South Africa emerged as Namibia’s largest export destination for March 2024 with a share of 20.6% of all goods exported, followed by Botswana with a share of 17.7%. Zambia, France and Belgium were among Namibia’s top five export markets.
The demand-side saw South Africa maintaining her position as Namibia’s largest source for goods, accounting for 36.2% of total imports, followed by China in second position with 7.6% of the market share.
Peru, Belgium and Bahrain also formed part of Namibia’s top five import markets. -mndjavera@nepc.com.na
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