LUSAKA, June 14 (Xinhua) -- The Zambian government on Thursday launched a strategy aimed at enabling the country to respond effectively to market opportunities offered by the U.S. government, through the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) initiative.
The National Response Strategy to the AGOA has been developed by the Ministry of Commerce, Trade and Industry with the support from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Southern Africa Trade and Investment Hub as part of efforts to enhance the utilization of trade preferences under the initiative.
The strategy will run from 2018 to 2025 in order to synchronize it with the expiry date of the current extension period of AGOA
Christopher Yaluma, Minister of Commerce, Trade and Industry, said during the launch of the strategy that despite the market preference opportunities provided by AGOA, Zambia has failed to take advantage of the offer due to a number of challenges.
"The strategy has been developed to address the challenges that Zambia has faced to effectively utilize preferences offered under AGOA. The strategy also comes with a work plan to assist policy makers and the private sector in taking advantage of opportunities offered by the AGOA initiative, while consolidating export capacities at the regional level," he said.
He said the strategy has been developed to make businesses take advantage of the opportunities provided by the AGOA initiative, adding that the initiative had the potential to increase trade relations with the United States.
According to him, despite AGOA providing preferential treatment covering over 6,400 product lines, including 700 agricultural products, from eligible sub-Saharan African countries, Zambia only imported goods worth 32,000 U.S. dollars in 2016.
The strategy has also outlined bottlenecks on the under-utilization of the AGOA initiative such as weak institutional support, non-traditional barriers, lack of awareness, inadequate production skills and lack of technology as well as competitive abilities.
According to him, the strategy further provides a prioritized roadmap for developing export competitiveness for Zambia under the AGOA trade preference program.
The Zambian minister said the ministry will embark on awareness projects such as the holding of roadshows to raise awareness on the opportunities provided by AGOA.
Daniel Foote, U.S. Ambassador to Zambia, said his government requested all AGOA-eligible countries to come up with national strategies following the failure by many countries to take advantage of the AGOA initiative.
