Gaborone: The Interim Economic Partnership Agreement (IEPA) has not only locked the European Union (EU) as an important market for Botswana exports but has in addition improved market access to duty free quota level on everything except sugar and rice. Consequently, Botswana has been able to make savings on the historical eight per cent special levy that its beef had been subjected to prior to the existence of IEPA.
Minister of Trade and Industry, Ms Dorcus Makgato-Malesu, said this amounted to more than P17 million based on the 2008 beef exports. She told Parliament on Thursday that the European Union remained Botswana's largest market for its non-diamond exports, absorbing around 70 per cent of the country's total exports and around 72 per cent of the beef exports.
Besides, Ms Makgato-Malesu said countries that exported textile to the EU could do so under flexible rules of origin since they were allowed much simplified manufacturing methods on a number of textile articles.
The Minister conceded that indeed South Africa and Namibia had registered reservation against attempt by the European Commission to restrict the flexibilities that could be made available to the SADC/EPA states on a few provisions of the IEPA.
Botswana and the other SADC/EPA states have continued to work with the two countries in negotiating resolution of these reservations. Consequently the majority of the reservations were resolved in March 2009 in Swakopmund, Namibia, said the minister. She said she hoped that by the time the negotiations for the final EPA were completed, every country's main interests would have been accommodated.
Ms Makgato-Malesu told the house that the SADC/EPA group was made up of three least developed countries, the middle income developing countries and one advanced developing country, all of which were competing and having differing levels of interests and specific concerns. She explained that out of the seven countries, South Africa in addition had a trade, development and cooperation agreement (TDCA) signed unilaterally with the EU (1999) which could provide it with a fallback position to protect its interests with the EU in any eventuality.
The minister said Botswana and the rest of the participating countries of the SADC region unfortunately did not have an equivalent fallback position and therefore, in the event that EPAs were not concluded, their trade interests with the EU would be worse than before the advent of the IEPA. She noted as an example that Botswana beef exports to the EU would be subjected to less than 20 per cent levy, rendering beef exports to that market less competitive.
Ms Makgato-Malesu said SA had an explicit ambition to promote the topical south-south trade arrangements with countries such as Brazil, China and India, something which she argued remained to be officially discussed and agreed at the regional level as it might be less priority to Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia and Swaziland.
She was responding to a question from Kweneng East MP, Maj Gen. Moeng Pheto who wanted to know Botswana's major benefits following her signature to the EPA with the EU together with some SADC countries who were Southern Africa Customs Union (SACU). Also he wanted to know what Namibia and SA reservations were in signing the agreement and progress made to bridge the difference. BOPA
