Ministers fail to resolve thorny EPA issue

Mbabane – The issue of Economic Partnership Agreements (EPA) remained sensitive and unresolved following a meeting of finance and commerce ministers from the five nations comprising the Southern African Customs Union (Sacu) in Swaziland last week. EPAs signed by Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland with the EU have been denounced by South Africa as unbalanced. The agreements require freeflow of African and European goods, but the former’s volumes hardly match the latter’s. South Africa has noted that European Union goods entering Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland would be cheaper than similar goods shipped directly to South Africa because they would not be subject to taxes of importing countries. SA authorities fear that these cheaper goods would find their way into SA, with Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland merely being used by European exporters as transhipment points to get goods into SA. At one point, SA customs authorities threatened to tighten customs controls within the region, which may hamper the already slow processing of cargo through national border posts. The African Trade Network has denounced EPAs as “EU re-colonialisation,” and noted that trade liberalisation enacted worldwide over the past two decades had seen a 50% drop in African exports from 6% of world trade to 3% this year. Ministers who spoke to FTW at the Sacu meet said other factors besides trade liberalisation also accounted for the drop-off in African global trade, but they agreed that there was a conflict between individual Sacu member states signing EPAs rather than negotiating in partnership with Sacu. “There’s an anomaly. What use is there maintaining a trade bloc if in practice every country looks after its own interests first?” said one official.