As the July 1 deadline looms for the conclusion of negotiations on tariff offers and rules of origin ahead of the launch of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), several commentators believe that the date should be postponed.
“The Covid-19 pandemic has derailed the work plan for completing the outstanding AfCFTA negotiations,” says Trudi Hartzenberg, executive director of Trade Law Centre (Tralac).
Writing in a blog for Tralac, Hartzenberg says after Africa’s first Covid-19 case was reported on February 14 in Egypt, African governments were forced to shift their priorities to focus on urgent national emergency measures.
“The implications for the AfCFTA are far-reaching. The outstanding negotiations are about basic aspects - tariff reductions, rules of origin and conditions for trade in services - in the five priority services sectors (financial, transport, communication, business services and tourism) without which AfCFTA-based preferential trade is not possible."
Basically it means that "the target date of 1 July 2020 cannot be met", Hartzenberg says.
She believes that under present conditions it may not be wise to set new deadlines for when trade under AfCFTA rules will commence because concluding the negotiations will need time and effort.
“The AfCFTA should not be a rushed job. Once the effects and implications of the pandemic are better understood, noting that getting it under control will take much longer, governments will be able to muster the resources and instruct officials to represent them in the negotiations for concluding outstanding AfCFTA matters. E-negotiations are an untested terrain. They may not be able to bring about the outcomes made possible by direct personal exchanges.”
The AfCFTA design is about a standard recipe for trade in goods and some services, she points out.
“The havoc caused by Covid-19 has demonstrated that there is a need to include additional issues in the final round of negotiations. Effective cross-border cooperation under conditions of a continent-wide emergency such as the present one deserves urgent attention.”
