AGOA DRIVES EXPORT-LED ECONOMY AMBITION

MBABANE – The retention of AGOA allows the country to increase the number of companies who are active in this space, while supporting the need to see Eswatini continue to become an export-led, private sector-driven economy.

These are some of the sentiments shared by the Eswatini Investments Promotion Authority (EIPA) Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Sibani Mngomezulu. The CEO said the retention of the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) makes opportunities for training critical in aligning trade with the current economic growth objectives. “We would like to applaud the government of Eswatini, through our guiding ministry, the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Trade for the commitment and unwavering support to create a stable business environment for traders and investors to operate within our borders,” said Mngomezulu. He highlighted that the retention of Eswatini under AGOA meant that businesses in the country would continue to enjoy preferential trade terms when selling their goods to the American market and in so doing, lay the platform for an increase in exports.

Promote

He said such achievements enable EIPA to more effectively carry-out its mandate to attract, promote, encourage and facilitate local and foreign direct investment and trade in Eswatini for economic development. The CEO highlighted that Eswatini’s annual export figures through AGOA in 2022 stood at just over E441 332 820 (US$23.5 million). He said export trade from Eswatini through AGOA was largely dominated by the export of sugar, followed by textiles and apparel, nuts and processed foodstuff, handcraft and cosmetics. He further highlighted that some of the more recent training opportunities EIPA has made available through support from its partners, include a recent collaboration with the USAID Africa Trade and Investment Southern Africa Buy-in Activity where Export Readiness Training targeting local domestic traders and aspiring exporting micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) was hosted. The training, which was given free of charge was aimed at capacitating local traders with the skills and technical knowledge required to export to the US.

Some of the areas which have been covered include how to export handcraft, cosmetics and food and beverages to the USA, import requirements for the USA for the above products, linking local traders with buyers in the USA and vendors in platforms such as Amazon.com and training traders on how to use e-commerce to access USA market and digital marketing.
The training has also included product development, export standards, export logistics, export finance and marketing your business for export.

Barriers

Another support mechanism includes EIPA’s collaboration with Business Eswatini through the support of the USAID Africa Trade and Investment Southern Africa Buy-in Activity in hosting the Annual Eswatini Exporter Awards. The awards seek to recognise and reward the outstanding performance and noteworthy efforts of local exporters in overcoming market entry barriers and as a result, achieving successful and consistent export trade. This year, several women owned, youth-owned and MSMEs formed part of the list of exporters who won awards for their exports to AGOA and other markets around the globe. The CEO mentioned that though Eswatini has over 50 000 MSMEs, currently less than 200 MSMEs in Eswatini are exporters with most of these trading only in the domestic market.

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