News
USA Looking For AGOA Legislation Renewal
US would like the African Growth and Opportunity Act legislation renewed to continue offering opportunity for sub-Saharan African countries. Penny Pritzker, US Secretary of Commerce, Stated, “I am going on from Nigeria to Ethiopia to talk to the leaders of the African Union about African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) which is our legislation that allows for 6,400 different goods from countries in sub-Saharan Africa to be sold into the United States tariff free. We want to see that legislation renewed.”
Currently, AGOA offers the opportunity for sub-Saharan African countries to continue to diversify their economies and sell more to the United States and that is one area the USA is focused on. AGOA was signed into law on May 18, 2000 as Title 1 of The Trade and Development Act of 2000. The Act offers tangible incentives for African countries to continue their efforts to open their economies and build free markets.
Speaking in Nigeria’s commercial capital Lagos, Pritzker said that United States had expanded the footprint of their foreign commercial service in Africa. Pritzker stated, “We have four countries that we are bringing new foreign commercial service officers to. These are folks that help American companies that want to do business in Africa or other parts of the world.”
The new countries that we are said to be bringing foreign commercial services are, Ethiopia, Angola, Tanzania and Mozambique. The US commerce secretary plans on leading a delegation of more than 20 companies who, she said, see the great opportunity in coming to the continent as part of a trade mission.
According to Pritzker, “The companies that I brought are focused predominantly on the energy sector and they do everything from services to technology, manufacturing to help with both generation, transmission distribution and including renewable energies. It’s a broad array of companies and they are thrilled at the opportunities they are finding.”
On security threat in Africa and especially Nigeria, the commerce secretary said the situation in North Nigeria with Boko Haram was very concerning and that America is working very closely with the Nigerian government to give them support but that won’t stop investments into Nigeria and other parts of the continent.
She advised, “American companies see the opportunity here in Nigeria and other parts of Africa and are able to sort out the differences and realize there are plenty of places where good business can be done. As I said, they see the growth, they understand, as the president said, Africa is the next economic success story in the world, and they want to be here and they want to partner and do good business.”
