Author: DEUS NGOWI
AfricaPress-Tanzania: TRADERS from Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi will benefit from training on trade facilitation that seeks to boost knowledge, skills on the World Trade Organization (WTO)’s Trade Facilitation Agreement (TFA).
Tanzania was picked to be the first country in the bloc to benefit from the training that is undertaken by the International Trade Centre (ITC) in partnership with the East African Business Council (EABC) and the Tanzania Private Sector Foundation (TPSF).
The workshops that kicked off at Kilimanjaro, Tanzania have been organized as part of the European Union-East African Community Market Access Programme (MARKUP).
The East African local business-support associations and traders are being equipped with a comprehensive knowledge of the TFA with a view to identifying obstacles on cross-border and advocate for their removal.
The initiative comes in a wake of trade and movement of people’s restrictions in some East African Community (EAC) member-states due to Covid-19 pandemic. It saw some countries, excluding Tanzania, undergoing strict lockdowns, closure of businesses that led to paralysis of intra-EAC trade.
This initiative has been developed in response to persistent delays and red tape hampering the movement of goods across borders in East Africa. Among the members of the community, inefficient trade procedures and non-tariff barriers represent obstacles to expanding intra-regional trade and deepened regional integration.
Trade facilitation – the simplification, modernization and harmonization of export and import processes – has thus become a key issue for the global trade system and regional economic communities, such as the EAC, to create new opportunities for businesses that are operating in regional and international markets.
A joint statement released by ITC and EABC officials noted that with provisions to speed up the movement, release and clearance of goods, the WTO TFA – which entered into force in February 2017 – represents a viable option to resolve cross-border trade inefficiencies.
As a result of the regional MARKUP initiative, project stakeholders will achieve greater sensitization on the need to simplify cross-border trade procedures and to ensure greater inclusion of the private sector in public-private dialogue platforms responsible for the implementation of the TFA at the national level.
This capacity-building initiative is an extension of the efforts undertaken since the entry into force in 2017 of the TFA, and is part of collaboration between EABC, the EAC Secretariat and ITC through the financial contribution of the European Union.
ITC is the joint agency of the WTO and the United Nations (UN) based in Geneva, Switzerland. ITC helps Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) in developing and transition countries to connect and become more competitive in global markets, contributing to the sustainable economic development in the Aid for Trade agenda and to the Sustainable Development Goals of the UN.
