The selection: Tuesday, 11 August

SADC: Time to open up (Tutwa)

To many, the convening of the Southern Africa Business Forum may not sound like much but it represents an important step in the region towards enhancing the engagement of a broader range of stakeholders in the debates on regional development. The private sector has a critical role to play in this regard and similar interactions regularly take place in other regional communities in Africa, including COMESA and the East African Community. Despite having one of the strongest and most vibrant formal business communities on the continent, it has taken time for SADC to acknowledge that there are mutually supportive objectives that could benefit from greater levels of cooperation with the private sector. [The author: Catherine Grant Makokera] [Follow SABF discussions on Twitter: @cathgmak, #SABF]

The SADC Summit: selected resources

SADC Summit: official website

SADC Legal Texts and Policy Documents: tralac’s resource page

Regional integration on track - SADC chief (Daily News)

Regional integration still a dream for SADC – Angelo Mondlane (StarAfrica)

Role of the SADC Tribunal in promoting human rights and regional integration (EOI from SADC Lawyers Association)

A reposting: National policies and regional integration in the South African Development Community

Botswana not in position to sign SADC gender protocol (Daily News)

Beyond good intentions: agricultural policy in the SADC region (Oxfam)

In countries such as Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique, between a quarter and half of the population are classified as being chronically undernourished. This briefing note argues that although policy makers in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) are aware of these challenges, they urgently need to move beyond rhetoric to an action-based agenda that will catalyze smallholder-led development in the region.

Can 'beneficiation' work for Namibia? (The Namibian)

There is simply little point in refining zinc or copper unless we think about exactly where we want to go in the value chain in 20 years and, like the Japanese 40 years ago, we are willing to spend the huge resources needed to get there. The problem is that Namibia alone is simply not big enough a producer of any base metal to dream of repeating alone what Japan and Korea did a lifetime ago. Beneficiation on a national scale in Namibia can only be a modest affair with limited economic benefits. But SADC could, at least in principle, repeat what Japan did because between Cape Town and the Congo, SADC has all the resources, skilled and enterprising people it needs to be as rich as Japan. But SADC is simply unwilling to do much in this regard as most of our neighbours think only of their narrow national commercial interests. Until our neighbours change, nothing will happen seriously on beneficiation that will benefit Namibia and all of Southern Africa in a significant way. [The author: Roman Grynberg]

South African cabinet publishes Border Management Agency Bill for public comment (GCIS)

The Bill seeks to establish a BMA that will balance secure cross-border travel, trade facilitation and national security imperatives, within the context of South Africa’s regional, African and international obligations. This single authority for border law enforcement provides the potential for more cost-effective services as well as enhanced security and management of the border environment. [Download]

Beitbridge one-stop border post soon: VP Mphoko (The Herald)

VP Mphoko said the rationale behind the concept of a one-stop border post was to put in place physical facilities, systems and processes that improve the ability of the two countries to perform joint border controls. He said the delays at the Beitbridge border post had seen other countries in the SADC region, Zambia, Malawi and the DRC in particular looking at the possibility of opening up another border post in the Nakala area of Mozambique. He said Zimbabwe risked losing a lot of potential revenue in the event the Nakala concept succeeded.

Shire Zambezi waterway project gets needed support from Zambian Government (Maravi Post)

First COMESA Transporters and Logistics Services Industries Regional Dialogue: concept note

Towards the establishment of a framework for combating illicit trade (COMESA Business Council)

The commissioning of this study by COMESA Business Council stems from an understanding and strong consensus from key stakeholders, that illicit trade, due to its far reaching negative impacts cannot be ignored. This report highlights the challenge of illicit trade at a national, regional and international level. It showcases the existing regulatory frameworks on combating illicit trade and demonstrates best practices. Drawing from experiences of key stakeholders, the report provides positions of selected industries on illicit trade. Above all, the study presents a sustainable approach to curbing illicit trade within the COMESA region which includes among others drafting a COMESA anti illicit trade protocol. Finally, the report concludes by highlighting recommendations to be considered and adopted by key stakeholders.

Nigeria: Ring-fencing the economy through ban on illicit financial flows (ThisDay)

The general assembly of the African Organisation For Standardisation General Assembly is being held this week: official www [from the concept note: as regional markets become increasingly integrated, divergent and inconsistent national and regional trade policy and standards issues constrain intra-regional trade of most commodities]

Shawn Donnan (@sdonnan): PBOC is trying to sell today's devaluation as reform. Not sure that's how it will be read in Washington. Or at IMF. [PBOC statement]

Africa’s throwing away dollars it can’t afford in currency rout (Bloomberg)

Address by Lesetja Kganyago, SARB Governor, at the Thomson Reuters Economist of the Year Awards (SA Reserve Bank)

Empowering SMEs to participate in local supply chains (COMESA)

The COMESA Business Council, working with the private sector, has launched a technical capacity strengthening project to empower small and medium entrepreneurs in standards and food safety management systems. The programme known as the Local Sourcing for Partnerships Project aims at helping SMEs to effectively participate in trade by addressing constraints which prevent them from being integrated into national and regional supply chains. The project will first be piloted in six COMESA countries namely Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Rwanda, Uganda and Zambia. Chairperson of the CBC Dr Amany Asfour said through the Local Sourcing for Partnerships Project, food suppliers will be trained on key standard requirements and food safety management systems. She said this was necessary for them to competitively integrate into the supply chains of the hospitality and other potential markets for the SME businesses.

Mozambique: Agricultural competitiveness in light of the resource boom (SPEED)

To contribute to a better understanding of the potential impacts of resource boom on agriculture, SPEED prepared a study 'Mozambique’s natural resource boom – what potential impacts on agriculture’s competitiveness?'. The study commissioned by CTA, highlights the potential resilience or vulnerability of the agriculture sector (looking at cotton, rice, soy, tomato and banana value chains) to possible Dutch disease pressures and review factors driving the competitiveness of five agricultural value chains in Mozambique. Although it emphasises cost analysis, other qualitative dimensions such as productivity or 'innovation', quality, agro-processing services, processed value-added, and risk management issues were also considered. [Downloads available]

Landscape for impact investing in East Africa

A total of $9.3bn in ‘impact-investment’ funds have flowed into East Africa over the past five years, with almost half of that amount being disbursed in Kenya, according to a new report. The ‘Landscape for impact investing in East Africa’ report, based on research funded by the UK Department for International Development’s impact programme, said the investments in Kenya exceeded $650 million in that period. Direct investments by development finance institutions 'favoured financial services', which represented nearly 40% of all direct deals, the report said. “The energy sector has received 25% of capital deployed to date (driven by large energy projects such as dams and wind farms), while infrastructure and mining have also been prominent.” [Downloads available]

Uhuru Kenyatta urges East Africa region to aim for growth (The East African)

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. [Download]

Joint communique by Uhuru Kenyatta and Yoweri Museveni

Museveni asks DRC to join EAC Common Market (The Citizen)

40 African innovators to watch (Ventures)

As part of our special focus on innovation in Africa, we have developed a list of 40 remarkable African innovators. Actually, it’s more like 47 but we counted teams as one. Our decision to celebrate these idea creators and solution providers stems from our belief that the true wealth of Africa is not buried under its soil, but in the brains of its best minds. This list is a testament to that belief. It comprises Africans from every part of the continent, across diverse fields. We have brought them together because of the impact and potential of their ideas and processes in transforming the continent.

Entrepreneurship and ICT innovation in Africa - evidence from Kenya (EOI from the AfDB)

Zimbabwe national business seminar: report (COMESA Business Council)

Zambia: Over 20000 undergo post-harvest training (Daily Mail)

Tanzania: Fertilizer consumption doubles in five years (Daily News)

When China met Africa (World Bank)

Sam Kutesa: 'We must think outside the box in fresh anti-poverty global agenda' (The East African)

Water in the GATS: methodology and results (OECD)

The main conclusion of the analysis is that, generally speaking, current services trade policies are much more open than what countries have committed in the GATS. It was known before, but the actuallevel of water is maybe higher than what could have been expected. Another interesting finding is that most of the water in the GATS comes from sectors that are “unbound”. Again, it was widely recognised that the absence of commitments in GATS could not be interpreted as sectors that are closed with no trade allowed. But the analysis highlights that these sectors are nonetheless, as a matter of fact, often fairly open.

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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)