African agricultural exports the focus of new AGOA capacity-building program

The Sixth Annual African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) Forum, held July 18-19 in Accra, Ghana, was capped with the announcement by U.S. officials of initiatives to strengthen the export-boosting trade measure first passed by Congress in 2000.

The more than 1,000 forum members agreed that a more diverse range of exports is needed and that Africa's agricultural sector should be strengthened. Some 6,400 African products are allowed duty-free, quota-free entry into U.S. markets under AGOA, but oil and gas products now account for more than 80 percent of those exports.

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said in a video link, "In recent years, we have expanded our cooperation together with several initiatives meant to help African businesses compete more successfully in the global economy." To make African agricultural products more competitive, they "must must meet the sanitary requirements of developed countries," Rice told the AGOA audience. "To help you reach this goal, we are instituting a new faculty exchange program to bring some of the best African agricultural specialists to study at American universities," she said.

Beginning in August, the new U.S.-Africa Sanitary-Phytosanitary Capacity Building Program will partner with African scientists and scholars to promote sound agricultural teaching and research techniques. During the first year of the program, two U.S. universities, Ohio State and Texas A&M, will host seven faculty members from six AGOA countries; Botswana, Ghana, Mauritius, Nigeria, Senegal and Uganda.

Mark Keenum, U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) under secretary, announced four initiatives designed to boost African agricultural exports :

1. In August, a training session will help Namibian beef inspectors better understand and implement U.S. meat import standards.
2. The West African Trade Investment Mission, set for February 2008, will bring 50 businessmen from the US and 10 African nations to Accra to explore joint investment opportunities.
3. An educational exchange under USDA's Norman Borlaug Fellowship Program will sponsor seven fellows from six AGOA nations to study cocoa production at several U.S. universities; and
4. A series of organic certification training workshops will be held throughout sub-Saharan Africa in 2008.

Acting U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Administrator Henrietta Fore also announced several infrastructural initiatives including :

-Implementation of the $7.7 million, five-year West Africa Seed Alliance (WASA), whose goals include establishing a commercial seed industry that ensures an affordable seed supply for small-scale farmers and creating $50 million in farm revenues for local economies seeking export markets. The project will be carried out in conjunction with private-sector firms like Monsanto and NGOs such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

-The Kalangala Infrastructure Services Project in Uganda that will upgrade roads, water supplies, electricity and ferry transport for the residents of Bugala Island in Lake Victoria. The goal is to create 5,000 new jobs while supplying clean water and energy to 50,000 residents, improving their living conditions and making it possible to raise and transport products for export.

- A new intellectual property rights assistance agreement signed with the U.S. Department of Commerce to help Africans enforce their intellectual property rights.

AllAfrica