News
tralac’s Daily News selection: 27 May 2015
The selection: Wednesday, 27 May
50 years at the service of Africa 1964-2014 - AfDB Golden Book
This Golden Jubilee is an important landmark for the African Development Bank and the rest of the continent. The Bank grew out of Africa’s quest for solidarity and cooperation during the 1960s, and has become the pre-eminent development finance institution on the continent. It has gone through various stages in its life cycle. Still, the Bank remained faithful to the objectives set by its founders – promoting economic integration, reducing poverty and raising Africa’s standing in the world.
Participants at AfDB seminar say open borders necessary for integration (AfDB)
Discussants at the meeting argued that simplifying visas to unlock the movement of talent would play a significant role in boosting Africa’s competitiveness and integration. Data from research on the subject entitled, “Unlocking Africa: Simplifying visas to allow the free flow of talent,” a collaboration between the World Economic Forum's Network of Global Agenda Councils, AfDB and McKinsey, presented at the seminar revealed that Africans require visas to travel to half of the countries on the continent. The statistics also show that only 14 African countries offer liberal access to all African citizens.
@AfricanBizMag: The best passports for getting around Africa without visas are those of Gambia, Cote D'Ivoire and Kenya
@achaleke: Somalis require the most visas to travel across Africa...
@achaleke: Kenyans Ivorians Gambians need visas to visit 41% of African countries. Cameroonians need visas for 59%!!!
Africa brings huge benefits for SA: Patel (Business Report)
Xenophobia must be countered by spreading the message to ordinary South Africans about the huge benefits which the rest of Africa brought to this country, Minister of Economic Development Ebrahim Patel said on Monday. He said 244 000 direct jobs in South Africa were sustained by exports to the rest of the Africa. And if one added the indirect effect through those direct workers paying taxes and buying goods the total number of direct and indirect jobs rose to 885 000. The largest export market for South African plastic products was Zimbabwe, for TVs it was Zambia and for clothing it was Mozambique, he said, focusing on countries where many immigrants had come from.
Impact of migration felt by many countries (Ghana Business News)
The seminar was held to assess the economic contribution of labour migration in developing countries as well as nations of destination including Ghana, La Cote d’Ivoire, Rwanda, South Africa, Kyrgzyz Republic, Nepal, Thailand, Dominican Republic, Costa Rica and Argentina. The four-year project, which began in 2014 was co-funded and jointly implemented by the European Commission, the OEDC Development Centre and the International Labour Organisation. It was aimed at arriving at a reliable and evidence-based understanding of the economic impact of immigration in low and middle-income countries.
Meet Mozambique's new visa rules (Club of Mozambique)
Tony Leon: 'How Gigaba has killed tourism in four easy steps' (RDM)
Zambia: Open borders for maize exports – Koch
AGRI-Wes managing director Nico De Koch has urged Government to consider opening up borders for maize export to enable more people venture into agriculture as a business. “If Government can offer a free market for agricultural products, prevent the dumping [of goods] from outside into the Zambian market, and open up the borders for us to trade with the Democratic Republic of Congo, we can supply them with maize instead of that country getting maize from South Africa as the case is,” he said.
Highlights from the #MegaTradingBlocs conference in Nairobi:
Regional trade blocs threat to WTO, CS Amina Mohamed warns (Daily Nation)
“It is therefore imperative to critically interrogate the potential impact of mega-regions in a view to formulating an appropriate response on how the agreements are likely to affect the excluded countries’ defensive and offensive trade interests. “We need (WTO) to strengthen the role and maintain and importance of the world trade organization in the trading system. We should not allow that role to be diluted,” she added.
@commonwealthsec: An Africa-wide Continental FTA could increase intra-African trade by $55.1 billion
@commonwealthsec: Megatradingblocs could lead to a $2.7bn reduction of Africa's exports
APEC and the WTO: 'Where are we heading?' (Jakarta Post)
Developing countries’ trade envoys in Geneva have become more concerned these days that discussions on such important issues have been kept behind closed doors in meetings among the so-called G5-Plus countries — namely the US, the EU, China, India, Brazil, Australia and Japan, with the director-general as the chair. To make things even worse, the rest of the WTO members could get information on what has been discussed only from some publications such as the Washington Trade Daily and more recently, the Third World Network’s journal SUNS. [The author, Iman Pambagyo, is the Indonesian ambassador in charge of the WTO]
Zimbabwe proposes legislation to fight ‘rampant’ illicit financial flows (The Source)
The government is crafting legislation to compel mining firms to release production data to the fiscus to help curb illicit financial flows (IFFs) and transfer pricing which is costing African countries at least $50 billion annually, finance minister Patrick Chinamasa said on Friday.
Slowdown fears as imports set for tighter screening (Business Daily)
Kenya is set to introduce tight screening measures on imports, sparking fears of slow down of cargo clearance at the Mombasa port. Treasury secretary Henry Rotich said measures to be implemented from as early as July, will see nearly 50 per cent of import cargo scanned. At the moment, only five per cent of the imported consignment is scanned.
KRA tightens cargo scrutiny to curb smuggling (Business Daily)
After the Vietnam seizure, the Kenya Revenue Authority said it would henceforth subject Kenya’s Sh100 billion a year tea export to tough security checks in a move that could further hurt the country’s top foreign exchange earner. The taxman’s Southern Region manager George Muia said tea will no longer be treated as low risk consignment because it had become an easy target for concealing contraband.
Botswana dry port a white elephant (New Era)
Botswana High Commissioner to Namibia Tshenolo Modise says the Botswana dry port is underutilised and has become an embarrassment. The High Commissioner was speaking at a two-day business forum organised by the Botswana Investment and Trade Centre in an effort to market and promote the Botswana dry port to businesses from both Namibia and Botswana. Construction of the Botswana dry port started in 2013 and was completed mid-2014.
China set to extend Nairobi-Naivasha railway (Business Daily)
Kenya has started talks with the Chinese contractor building the new Mombasa-Nairobi railway to extend the line to Naivasha from 2017. The extension of 120 kilometres will link special industrial zones that would be established at Naivasha to Nairobi and Mombasa, according to a statement from State House.
How China will drive Dar’s plan for industrialisation (The Citizen)
The government’s goal to turn Tanzania into a semi-industrialized nation is officially starting this year, with a number of high-profile projects on the cards. If what the minister for Industry and Trade, Dr Abddallah Kigoda, told Parliament in Dodoma yesterday is anything to by, then construction of the Sh5-trillion twin Mchuchuma coal and Liganga iron-ore mining projects will officially kick off before the end of this year. Mchuchuma is estimated to bear 540 million tonnes of coal deposits, which is enough to produce 600MW for a period of over 100 years. Out of the megawatts, said Dr Kigoda, 250MW will be at Liganga iron-ore mining project while the remaining 350MW will be injected into the national grid.
Government, Arab states to sign labour export deals (Daily Monitor)
To stop the abuse of Ugandans searching for greener pastures, the Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development is in the final stages of signing bilateral labour deals with eight Arab countries. The countries include the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Iraq, Kuwait, Somalia and Afghanistan. Mr Bigirimana said: “We also want to manage irregular migration and regulate recruitment by private firms exporting labour.”
Future scenarios for energy in SA and SADC (CUSP Consulting)
This paper explores the current trends in energy sustainability in South Africa and the Southern African Development Community. An exploration is made of the current factors affecting energy supply, production, consumption and security and these are forecast into a baseline scenario for energy in SA. Alternative scenarios have been constructed considering the policy approach and private sector strategy that would be required, to ensure energy sustainability through an integrated regional approach. The authors demonstrate that opportunities exist regionally in the energy sector, through new partnerships and investments, and explore the antecedents required to unlock their implementation.
NANTS urges implementation of ECOWAS Common Tariff to boost regional trade
The National Association of Nigerian Traders (NANTS) has called for the implementation of the ECOWAS Common External Tariff to boost regional trade among member countries. “There must be some level of carefulness in the implementation of the CET, the enforcement of the laws, because we are porous, so that we do not allow third parties to benefit, while we lose and then we become a dumping ground, our industries will stifled and die away. There must be constant monitoring of the impact of the CET on the economy; the future is watching, history is waiting.”
5-year import ban on rice could earn Nigeria $2.6bn annually’ (ThisDay)
Former minister of commerce and industry, Charles Ugwuh at the weekend called on Nigeria to place a five-year import embargo on rice, saying within such timeframe, the country could concentrate efforts on in-country production, displace imports and save $2.6 billion spent annually on rice imports.
Ghana and the new African Growth and Opportunity Act (GhanaWeb)
Ghana can take advantage of AGOA by focusing on a few carefully selected products and rapidly building our capability to effectively produce, process and export such products. Ghana can also take advantage of the capability development programmes that will be promoted by the various US agencies. [The author is the Executive Secretary of the American Chamber of Commerce, Ghana]
Latest credit ratings: Nigeria, Angola and Gabon downgraded; Kenya, Uganda stable; Rwanda improves (M7G Africa)
Zim, Nigeria urged to sign BIPA (Southern Times)
Building a Mozambican agriculture powerhouse: just join up the dots - with finance, preferably
Ethiopian Airlines to fly to Cape Town (ETNW)
George Wachira: 'IMF regional economic outlook report highlights ways to increase trade, jobs' (Business Daily)
Poorest nations, not just richest, must act to end extreme poverty: campaigners (Thomson Reuters Foundation)
@akin_adesina: We must share the risk AND the reward, particularly in fragile states, in order to realize Africa's true potential.
The Annual World Bank Conference on Africa: confronting conflict and fragility in Africa (8-9 June)
The 2015 Natural Resource Governance Institute Conference (25-26 June)
China and UK hold consultations on African Affairs (China MFA)
This post has been sourced on behalf of tralac and disseminated to enhance trade policy knowledge and debate. It is distributed to over 300 recipients across Africa and internationally, serving in the AU, RECS, national government trade departments and research and development agencies. Your feedback is most welcome. Any suggestions that our recipients might have of items for inclusion are most welcome. Richard Humphries (Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.; Twitter: @richardhumphri1)
