Desie Heita
19 May 2008
analysis
The practicality of establishing a common customs union for either the Southern African Development Community (SADC) or for the continent remains fuzzy. Nor does the SADC region appear to be set on having a customs union by 2010, as state members themselves have committed.
The European Union Ambassador to Namibia, Dr Elisabeth Pape briefly referred to this during the Europe Day celebration in Windhoek recently.
Pape was making a point that the European Union does support regional integration and does believe that the Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) with SADC would strengthen regional integration, something that the African leaders are fighting for. The problems, however, are in the implementation process.
Further, the recently held Joint Parliament Assembly between the European Parliament and the SADC Parliament in Windhoek once again highlighted the complexities of regional integration.
It came to the fore, again, that overlapping memberships by member states bring headaches, such as those recently incurred in the negotiations of the EPAs.
"It [is] difficult, from an economic perspective, to establish customs unions in a region with overlapping memberships such as the SADC region, as such configuration would have the effect of undermining and complicating intra-region trade," politicians said in a joint communiqué from the Joint Parliament Assembly.
The African, Caribbean and Pacific countries and the European Union had a Joint Parliament Assembly for Southern Africa in Windhoek on April 28 to 30l.
SADC is probably one of the trading blocks with the most overlapping memberships with some members belonging to the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA).
In the negotiations for EPAs between SADC and the EU, SADC members are negotiating on two fronts - seven countries negotiating EPAs as SADC and others as east Africa.
Regional integration is a topic that economists, analysts and politicians have mulled over for years. Yet, its implementation remains elusive.
SADC ministers, for instance, have grappled over which route to take on establishing a common custom union. Already under the SADC trading block, there is a Southern Africa Customs Union (SACU) with members Namibia, South Africa, Botswana, Lesotho, and Swaziland. The question has been whether the best way will be to incorporate other states into SACU one by one until the entire SADC is covered.
Implementation headaches aside, Africa does want to reach the level of prosperity as the European Union.
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