S. Africa says its access in AGOA guaranteed until 2025

South Africa has resolved all the issues to guarantee its access in the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) until 2025, the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) said on Thursday.

The issues relating to the three meats (poultry, pork and beef) have been resolved thus paving a way for continued preferential access into the U.S. market for the duration of AGOA, the department said.

Discussions are on-going to resolve issues of interests to South Africa and facilitate market access of products of export interest to South Africa such as chicken breast, mutton/lamb meat, sheep and goat embryos, horses, beef, and ostrich meat, it said.

In addition to these products, other products of interest to South Africa in the U.S. market are apples, pears, stone fruits, litchis, citrus, avocados and mangoes, according to the department.

DTI said South Africa continues to engage with the U.S. through strategic platforms such as the Trade Investment Framework Agreement to enhance mutually beneficial trade and investment between the two parties.

The AGOA, a legislation that was approved by the U.S. Congress in May 2000, is to assist the economies of Sub-Saharan Africa and to improve economic relations between the U.S. and the region. The Act provides trade preferences for quota and duty-free entry into the U.S. for certain products. The U.S. renewed the AGOA for another decade in July last year.

South Africa had been under pressure to open its market to certain meat products from the U.S. or face compromising agricultural benefits under the AGOA.

In March, the two countries reached an agreement, under, which South Africa allows a quota of 65,000 tonnes of poultry to be imported from the U.S.yearly.

According to DTI, total trade between South Africa and the U.S. stood at 155 billion rand (about 105 million U.S. dollars) in 2015. Enditem