O Mail & Guardian é uma escola de bom jornalismo em que os nossos semanários deviam inspirar-se. Numa altura em que as lideranças africanas sonham em avançar para os Estados Unidos de África, o M&G faz aqui uma análise interessante, primeiro, sobre as fundações regionais para o desenvolvimento do continente, os blocos regionais. Isto sim, é assunto de interesse público, não meramente de foro académico. Até porque a abordagem permite buscar "estórias da vida real", no nosso caso, de como fenómenos quais "mukherismo", "dealers de carros" ajudam a perceber o que será de Moçambique após a integração regional em 2008.
Irrita-me bastante estar-se sempre a citar o Ministro do "Made In Moçambique" e empresários cépticos e ou optimistas, é mau esse jornalismo de ouvir o que dizem tais líderes e decretar: eis o que nos espera a integração regional!
Vejam a análise do M&G, da (in)eficácia dos blocos regionais/zonas de comércio no fortalecimento dos negócios intra-regionais, para a estabilidade política e como "músculo" para as grandes batalhas internacionais (com UE e no concerto da OMC), para perceber-se que caminho ainda temos de percorrer até que se realize (não como tratado pelos chefes de Estado, mas no dia-a-dia do "mano africano") o sonho de Kwame Nkrumah.
Regozija-me quando o jornalismo cumpre esse seu papel de catalisador de debate das grandes questões que realmente afectam a vida do cidadão, não se a RENAMO pôs fim a boleia da União Eleitoral...
Trade in Africa
10 Jul 2007, Mail & Guardian
JOHANNESBURG: There are an estimated 30 regional trade arrangements (RTAs) in Africa, and, on average, each African country belongs to four RTAs.
The motivation for setting up African RTAs is the desire to stimulate economic growth through regional cooperation, especially for small landlocked African countries, which can gain access to the sea by joining RTAs.
In the context of this week’s discussion at the African Union summit about the formation of a United States of Africa, the Mail & Guardian takes a look at four existing RTAs -- the Southern African Development Community (SADC), the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa), the Economic and Monetary Union of Central African States (Cemac) and the Economic Community of West African States (Ecowas).
Have RTAs increased intra-African trade?
According to an International Monetary Fund study, RTAs have not been seen to increase intra-African trade significantly. After declining during the Seventies and then recovering in the mid-Eighties to early nineties, intra-African trade is now stagnating at 10% of total African trade -- in spite of increased regional integration efforts. Intra-RTA trade has also not shown a consistent pattern when compared with trade with the rest of the world.
Have RTAs enhanced the share of African trade in overall global trade? Africa’s share in global trade volumes actually declined from 4% in the Seventies to 2% by 2004, including oil exports. Manufactured goods, especially of textiles and clothing -- which often drives export growth in developing countries -- has also stagnated since the Seventies, at 0,5%.
Have RTAs increased African countries bargaining power when it comes to international trade negotiations?
Analysts say that Africa’s bargaining power in international trade negotiations will only be enhanced if African countries adopt common positions, both in terms of other countries lowering trade barriers and in terms of eliminating their own protective mechanisms. In the past, African countries have agreed that the Doha round of the trade talks should be more development oriented and that industrialised nations should increase access to their markets.
However, the devil is in the detail, and there has been little consensus on individual trade issues such as cotton.
Background
Ecowas was created in Togo on November 5 1976, aimed at promoting cooperation over economic, social and cultural activities and, ultimately, a monetary and economic union.
Member states
Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Cote d’Ivoire, The Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone and Togo.
Institutions established by Ecowas include a community Court of Justice, the Ecowas parliament and the mechanism for conflict prevention, management and resolution, peace and security.
The Ecowas parliament was first convened in May 2002, with 115 MPs representing all member states, except Côte d’Ivoire.
The parliament, which is based in Abuja, Nigeria, plays only an advisory role. The long-term plan is for it to acquire legislative powers and to have directly elected members (current members are drawn from the countries’ national parliaments). It is not clear when this will happen, as the various member states have yet to agree on what powers they are willing to devolve regionally.
Ecowas has tried to help to maintain regional stability through its conflict prevention mechanism, which has the regional mandate for conflict intervention. During the early Nineties Ecowas became heavily involved in the conflict in Liberia, with the deployment of the Ecowas Ceasefire Montoring Group (Ecomog). However, the intervention was controversial because Ecomog troops were seen to be taking sides against Liberian rebel Charles Taylor’s forces. Nonetheless, the deployment was the first by a regional body and Ecomog subsequently intervened in Sierra Leone and Guinea, as well as along the Guinea-Bissau-Senegal border. Many people see Ecomog as the body’s main success, crediting it with preventing larger-scale regional conflict and providing a model for a regional African military force.
At the same time, however, the various interventions also exposed cracks in the regional body, often along Anglophone-Francophone lines.
There are a number of powerful states with different political agendas in Ecowas, a reality which is likely to continue to complicate and delay more profound political and economic integration. At present there is very little coordination or alignment of the member states’ fiscal and monetary policies. A deadline for the establishment of a second monetary union (eight Ecowas member states are already part of the Economic and Monetary Union of West Africa, which shares the CFA franc) by 2004 has not been met, largely because of political and economic differences between member states. Nonetheless, plans to move towards monetary union and to enhance regional integration remain on the agenda.
The Economic and Monetary Community of Central Africa (Cemac)
Background
Cemac was formed on June 25 1999 in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea, as a successor to the Customs and Economic Union of Central Africa (UDEAC), which was formed in 1964.
Member states
Cameroon, Central African Republic, the Republic of Congo, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea and Chad.
Cemac is an effective customs and monetary union, using one currency, the CFA franc, which is used in Francophone countries in West Africa.
In the past eight years Cemac has focused on the following objectives:
* Harmonising economic and financial policy with a view towards creating a common market;
* Coordinating national policies on agriculture, fishing, industry, commerce, tourism, transport, telecommunications and livestock;
* Initiating the process of implementing the free circulation of goods, services, capital and people;
* Coordinating commercial policy and regional economic policy towards other regions; and
* Converging economic and fiscal policy to support and consolidate the monetary union.
Economic and monetary integration
The monetary union is fully functional and managed by a committee of finance ministers from the six member states, through the Bank of Central African States, the union’s central bank. Other areas of effective economic and developmental cooperation include: a common value-added tax, a common programme to enhance macroeconomic performance and stability, international infrastructure rehabilitation projects, a common agricultural policy, forestry policy and recognition by the World Trade Organisation of Cemac as a registered customs and monetary union.
Political integration
Progress in the area of political integration has taken place mostly in matters of security. Cemac member states have adopted a non-aggression, solidarity and mutual assistance pact and in 2002 formed a multinational intervention force for the region. Since then it has deployed members of the force to assist in the stabilisation of the Central African Republic (CAR), where there has been ongoing instability since former president Ange Felix Patasse was ousted by Francois Bozize in March 2003.
Apart from this there has been little progress in political integration. Two of the group’s member states are involved in cross-border conflict linked to instability in both countries, as well as in Darfur. Chadian rebels based in Sudan have made frequent incursions into northeastern CAR, while there are also recurring conflicts over grazing rights between armed Chadian pastoralists and locals in the CAR. In recent months the conflict has started to spread to neighbouring Cameroon, a third Cemac member state.
Southern African Development Community (SADC)
Background
The regional grouping morphed into its present form in 1992 when it changed from the Southern African Development Coordination Conference, formed in 1980, into the Southern African Development Community (SADC).
Member states
Angola, Botswana, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
Economic and monetary integration
* Population: 230-million.
* Five SADC member states are members of the Southern African Customs Union (Sacu), formed in 1910. These are South Africa, Botswana, Lesotho, Swaziland and Namibia.
* Total European Union imports from SADC: €5,5-billion.
* Trade: in 2002 exports from South Africa made up 17% of total imports within the region. South Africa’s GDP, population and trade dwarf that of its Sacu neighbours.
* Overall, in terms of volume and value, intra-SADC trade is dominated overwhelmingly by South Africa.
* The most heavily SADC-dependent of the member states are Zambia and Malawi, who source 57% and 54%, respectively, of their total imports from fellow SADC members.
* SADC and Sacu are different in outlook. Sacu -- appropriately, since it has been in existence longer -- has covered more ground towards regional integration than SADC, which still has to achieve the status of a free trade area (FTA), a goal it hopes to reach by 2010.
* Sacu is the United States’s second-largest trading partner in Africa after Nigeria, whose chief export is petroleum.
* Analysts say different levels of development in the region mean that smaller economies are always wary of being overrun by companies from the more advanced South Africa.
* Another cause of friction in the region comes from Portugal, former colonial power in Mozambique and Angola. Portugal is seen as South Africa’s main competitor in Angola, -- the petrochemical and diamond economy of which look outward towards its Lusophone kith and kin in Brazil and Portugal.
* An analyst, Albert Makochekanwa, argued that SADC and Sacu don’t necessarily share similar objectives. SADC is more concerned with establishing an FTA, while Sacu is concerned with integrating its member states into the global economy through enhanced trade and investment, as it is already a fully fledged customs union.
* One of SADC’s stated aims is harmonising “political and socio-economic policies and plans of member states”. This has become more difficult since the combustion in Zimbabwe, which was until recently the region’s second-most powerful economy.
* South Africa is the biggest player both in the union and in the community. Makochekanwa points out that in some cases South Africa has entered into trade agreements with which other Sacu members did not agree, but of which they became de facto members.
Common Market for East and Southern Africa (Comesa)
Background
Comesa was formed in 1994 to replace the Preferential Trade Area (PTA), which was formed in 1981. Its founding ambition was the formation of a large economic and trading unit to overcome barriers faced by individual states.
Member states
Angola, Burundi, Comoros, Democratic Republic of Congo, Djibouti, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Libya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Rwanda, Seychelles, Sudan, Swaziland, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
Economic and monetary integration
* Economic performance: In 2005 the Comesa region recorded a growth rate of 5,8%.
* Total trade: $159-billion.
* Intra-Comesa trade: $6,3-billion in 2005, $4,5-billion in 2004 and $3-billion in 2000.
* Monetary integration: none; member states use their own currencies or the United States dollar. Comesa wants to achieve a customs union by December next year and a full monetary union by 2025.
* Political integration: maybe because of its size and its sprawling reach, Comesa is perhaps the least integrated of the regional organisations. It is made up of states such as Libya, where elections are not held, and functional democracies such as Zambia.
* Comesa institutions: these are meant to promote sub-regional cooperation. These include the Comesa Trade and Development Bank and the Re-Insurance Company (Zepre) in Nairobi, Kenya; and Comesa Clearing House and Comesa Association of Commercial Banks in Harare, Zimbabwe, the Comesa Leather Institute in Ethiopia. A Court of Justice was established under the Comesa Treaty and became formally operational in 1998.
* Most member states are exporters of raw materials and as a result they can’t trade with one another because most of their exports are geared to Europe, North America and, increasingly, China.
* As a result of its size one obvious problem is overlapping membership, described as a major concern by analysts. According to World Trade Organisation rules, a country cannot belong to more than one customs union with different external tariff agreements.
* Comesa straddles northern and Southern Africa and one obvious problem is the high cost and difficulty of transporting goods. Comesa deputy secretary general Sindiso Ngwenya says border delays cost truck companies up to $400 a day in losses, which are then passed on to the consumer.
* Comesa is looking at establishing a customs union in December next year. This means that members will have to adjust their national tariffs to the agreed common external tariff for raw materials and capital goods.
