SA and USA resolve Agoa issues

South Africa has resolved a trade row with the U.S. which threatened millions of dollars worth of business, its trade minister has said.

On Monday, he told the media that issues surrounding salmonella infected poultry, as well as livestock that had not been reared in the USA, were two sticking issues.

The trade program has helped South Africa more than double its exports to the US since 2000. “South Africa imports from over 3000 establishments across the world, and the testing requirements apply to all these establishments”, the department said.

He said that even if the United States proceeded to block South African produce from its market, Pretoria could still eventually benefit.

Davies says the negotiations were to ensure not only the health and well-being of South Africans, but of the country’s livestock. Now Davies is awaiting formal indication from the USA that the agreement has been concluded, he said.

“While we celebrate the progress we have made in resolving the outstanding technical issues, the true test of our success will be based on the ability of South African consumers to buy American product in local stores”, he said.

“On beef, South Africa had already agreed to import beef from the US”, he said.

This has paved the way for US President Barack Obama to announce that he will not after all suspend the duty-free access for SA’s agricultural exports into the US under the African Growth and Opportunity Act (Agoa). Negotiations also continued over beef and pork health issues.

South Africa exported $176 million in agricultural products to the United States under AGOA in 2014 and potential lost benefits are estimated to total $4 million to $7 million. This would be subject to several conditions being met. But virtually chicken imports were not allowed into the South Africa market because of outbreaks of avian flu in parts of the US and because of concerns about salmonella infection.

In June this year officials from both sides agreed partly to lift the anti-dumping duties on US chicken imports, to allow a quota of 65,000 tons a year to be imported.