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Africa: The 2018 AGOA Forum: A Turning Point for US-Africa Commercial Relations?
Brookings, 9 July 2018
The 2018 AGOA Forum—named for the African Growth and Opportunity Act passed in 2000 and extended three years ago to 2025—could be a turning point in U.S.-African… Read more »
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Africa: President's Message - The Africa E Journal | May/June 2018
Corporate Council on Africa, 9 July 2018
In the coming weeks, U.S. and African senior government officials, private sector and civil society representatives will meet at the 17th U.S.- sub-Saharan Africa Trade and… Read more »
The Brookings Institution (Washington, DC)
Agoa Trade Pact Under Review at Forum in Washington, DC
The 2018 AGOA Forum-named for the African Growth and Opportunity Act passed in 2000 and extended three years ago to 2025-could be a turning point in U.S.-African commercial relations, Witney Schneidman and Landry Signé's write in a preview of this week's gathering of African ministers, U.S. officials and private sector and civil society representatives. The meetings in Washington, DC include the AGOA Private Sector Forum, organized by the Corporate Council on Africa, the CSO Forum and the Diaspora Roundtable, sponsored by the Leon Sullivan Foundation.
InFocus
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East African countries have been receiving second-hand clothing from the U.S. via AGOA, initially passed by the American Congress in 2000 to allow for low-income African countries to export some goods without paying tariffs. This has had a negative impact on local markets, according to Garth Frazer, Associate Professor of Economic Analysis and Policy at the University of Toronto, and when some countries like Rwanda attempted to restrict the second-hand clothing imports, the Donald Trump
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President Donald Trump has said that Rwanda's barriers to U.S. exports of used apparel and footwear are the reason for his latest threat to suspend duty-free treatment of clothing imports from Rwanda under the African Growth and Opportunity Act. In 2015, the East African Community adopted a three-year gradual process to phase out the importation of second-hand clothes and footwear, to promote textile, apparel and leather industries in the region.
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"The days of non-reciprocal trade arrangements are gone," according to Witney Schneidman and Moyombuya Ngubula from the Brookings Institution's African Growth Initiative. It is time to explore new arrangements for U.S.-Africa trade to take the place of the AGOA trade pact that expires in 2025. They advocate creating of a high-level panel by the United States and African Union.
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Lomé is hosting the first African Growth and Opportunity Act forum since President Trump took office, with a large U.S. delegation headed by Robert Lighthizer, his trade representative. Representatives from 34 African countries are taking part in the annual event. The meeting will provide first opportunity for a substantive presentation of the administration's approach to economic and trade relations with the continent. Accompanying official discussions are parallel private sector and civil
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