South Africa has been cleared to host the annual African Growth and Opportunity Act (Agoa) forum in November.
US trade representative, Katherine Tai, and South Africa’s Minister of Trade and Industry, Ebrahim Patel, made the announcement in a joint statement on Wednesday.
To finalise it, Patel met with Tai to discuss the venue for the 20th US-sub-Saharan Africa Trade and Economic Cooperation Forum.
The Agoa forum has been officially set down for Johannesburg from 2-4 November.
Agoa was established in 2000 to map the way forward for US-SA trade relations.
Currently, an additional 34 other sub-Saharan African countries are eligible to benefit from it.
There was a push by a bipartisan group of legislators in the US to move the conference to another country because of South Africa’s refusal to decry Russia’s invasion of Ukraine due to its “non-aligned” stance.
South Africa was also unwilling to commit to arresting Russia’s president Vladimir Putin if he attended the 15th Brics summit held in Johannesburg in August.
There is a warrant of arrest for Putin issued by the International Criminal Court.
At the last minute, Putin decided not to attend the summit in person, sending the Russian Federation’s minister of foreign affairs, Sergey Lavro,v in his place.
Putin addressed the summit remotely.
The US also accused South Africa of clandestinely providing weapons to Russia for its war in Ukraine, which was denied.
The Agoa trade pact allows preferential access for some SA products to the US markets. The current 10-year cycle of Agoa, before its structure comes up for review, ends in 2025. There were even fears among market watchers that South Africa could be excluded from Agoa altogether.
To try to save the situation President Cyril Ramaphosa sent high-powered envoys, up to ministerial level, to the White House. The official political opposition also went to plead South Africa’s case.
