THE Zimbabwe National Chamber of Commerce (ZNCC) said on Wednesday that it was working with business partners and the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa) to eliminate barriers that hinder the growth in trade among African countries.
In an interview on the sidelines of the BIZNET Awareness Workshop for International Traders in Harare on Wednesday, ZNCC chief executive Christopher Mugaga emphasised the chamber’s commitment to addressing obstacles affecting trade within the region.
“We are a member of Comesa, as you know, that’s the reason why we are here. For the 21 member States, we want to remove the barriers to trade, especially the non-tariff barriers and also to make sure that when you are to negotiate with the world, [just last week there was FOCAC in China, you always have EU], you have all these agreements,” he said.
“So what’s more important for us is to make sure that when we arrange for trade agreements, they have to be friendly to all the parties within the market. But overall, I think what’s more important is to capacitate our industries, to have capacity to export because some of the barriers, they are academic, as long as you don’t have goods which you are exporting.”
Mugaga said the participation of small to medium enterprises (SMEs) in the training workshop reflected a strong commitment from the government and SMEs to bolster the country’s economy.
ZNCC is working with the Industry and Commerce ministry to strengthen SMEs, which contribute over 60% to Zimbabwe’s gross domestic product.
“In terms of participation, obviously, I think you can see the excitement on our SMEs. Maybe as a background, I can tell you that there were more than 1 000 applications for this training, but we only had to trim down to an average of about 90 companies, which are in the room right now. So, given this, you can actually see the appetite of small and medium enterprises to work especially with the private sector,” the Mugaga said.
“So, we will continue pushing and capacitating them up the value chain so that they will not remain SMEs. We are working together with the Minister of Industry and Commerce, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, as well as the Minister of SMEs. So, the agenda is to capacitate the small businesses,” he said.
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Comesa market access expert Nsangwa Ngwira added that the bloc was actively working to eliminate trade barriers.
Some countries have already begun easing visa restrictions to promote free trade and the movement of people.
“Absolutely, when you look at goods, they don’t move by themselves. They move with people almost all the time. So we do have the Sadc, we have Comesa, we have the East African Community, so issues of movement of people, free movement of people, these are things that are actively under discussion. I’m sure you have seen a number of countries have eased their visa restrictions,” Ngwira said.
“You look at Kenya, for example. You look at Rwanda. So this is something that is actively being discussed and reforms are not an event, they are a process. So it takes time and each country is slowly reforming towards that. But within a wider context of Comesa, there is a lot that is going on, a lot of work in progress. But rest assured, that is happening.”
Ngwira said the upcoming continental free trade initiatives, would be be crucial for facilitating movement.
He said numerous programmes were in progress at both Comesa and African Union levels, focusing on capacity building and legal reforms necessary for seamless trade.
