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The shorter road is not always the less expensive road

Monday, 15 August 2022 05:58

Ease of moving goods is critical in the choices of transport companies. And in Africa, the shorter road is not always the less expensive road. This video from the Brenthurst Foundation documents the case of a shipment of copper cathodes via road from Solwezi, in Zambia, provincial capital of the mineral-rich North-Western Province, to the port of Walvis Bay, in Namibia, for a total distance of about 2,300 Km. It describes the challenges, and the costs of moving a 34-tonnes load along the poor roads connecting the Zambian mining centre to the Namibian port, including the “soft infrastructure” costs, i.e.; costs associated to crossing borders and waiting time at the port during which the truck remains idle awaiting a return cargo to transport back to Zambia.

African Tripartite Business Council formed

Sunday, 14 August 2022 06:10

The EAC, COMESA and SADC Business Councils have officially launched and formed the African Tripartite Business Council to spearhead the inclusion of joint private sector policy proposals representing traders from these 3 regions into the negotiations of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) and the African Tripartite Free Trade Area (TFTA) Agreements. The decision has been adopted at the Consultative Meeting of Regional Business Councils on the Implementation of the AfCFTA organized by the East African Business Council (EABC) on 10th August 2022 in Kigali, Rwanda and aims at the formulation of joint private sector policy positions to be submitted to the AfCFTA Secretariat in Ghana and to the Tripartite Ministerial Council Meetings in order to accelerate the implementation of the two Agreements.

Arbitral Ruling on safeguard measure within the EU-SADC EPA finally published

Friday, 12 August 2022 08:22

As described in our previous post, at the beginning of August 2022, an arbitration panel decided on the first case of dispute on a bilateral safeguard measure adopted within a European Partnership Agreement (EPA) of the European Union (EU). Both the EU and the Southern African Customs Union (SACU) have been celebrating this decision, stating that it was more favourable to the one, rather than the other organisation. Now that the ruling has been published, it seems to us that it is more favourable to SACU. This is, briefly, the description of the facts.

ECCAS and CEMAC set to converge toward a single REC by end 2023

Thursday, 11 August 2022 11:27

Central African Ministers members of the Steering Committee for the Rationalisation of Regional Economic Communities in Central Africa (COPIL/CER-AC), are meeting today and tomorrow in Yaoundé, Cameroon, to decide the future of the main two Regional Economic Communities (RECs) active in Central Africa. Plans to replace these two RECs with a single, better-structured and more efficient Community date back to October 2007, when the 13th Conference of Heads of State and Government of the Economic and Monetary Community of Central Africa (ECCAS) held in Brazzaville, mandated the Chairpersons of the Economic Community of Central African States (CEMAC) and of ECCAS to create a Steering Committee with the aim of drawing up a roadmap of actions to harmonise policies, programmes and instruments of integration of the two communities in view of the creation, with time, of a new single Regional Economic Community in Central Africa. This Steering Committee - the COPIL/CER-AC - was established on 24 October 2009 at the 14th Conference of Heads of State and Government of ECCAS, held in Kinshasa, DRC, who also designated the Minister of Economy of Cameroon as its Chair.

Overview of findings of the fourth mid-year coordination meeting between the AU and RECs

Tuesday, 09 August 2022 15:43

A recent article published on the Institute for Security Studies (ISS) website gives an overview of the findings of the fourth mid-year coordination meeting between the AU, Regional Economic Communities (RECs) and regional mechanisms (RMs) for Conflict Prevention, Management and Resolution held on 17 July in Lusaka, Zambia. Such meetings were established by the Heads of State and Governments Assembly Decision AU/Dec.635(XXVIII) adopted at the 28th Ordinary Session of the Assembly of 30 - 31 January 2017. Art. 5/c/iii of the Decision establishes that in place of the June/July Summit, the Bureau of the African Union Assembly “shall hold a coordination meeting with the Regional Economic Communities, with the participation of the Chairpersons of the Regional Economic Communities, the AU Commission and Regional Mechanisms”. The first coordination meeting was held on 8 July 2019 in Niamey, Niger.

News

The shorter road is not always the less expensive road

African Tripartite Business Council formed

Arbitral Ruling on safeguard measure within the EU-SADC EPA finally published

ECCAS and CEMAC set to converge toward a single REC by end 2023

Overview of findings of the fourth mid-year coordination meeting between the AU and RECs

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