Uganda Could Face a New Import Ban if Sub-Standard Producers Not Eliminated From EU Export Supply Chains

These sanitary issues suggest a major need to improve the effectiveness of the Ugandan competent authority in regard acting on reports of exports of chemically contaminated products. This remains an ongoing challenge (see epamonitoring.net articles, ‘Uganda Takes Steps to Improve Traceability Around SPS Export Controls’, 11 July 2019 and ‘Increased Levels of Pest Interception in Uganda Leads to Pre-Emptive Export Ban’, 27 May 2019).

Having more than doubled in value in the five years between 2012 and 2016 (+126%), Ugandan vegetable sector export growth dipped and stagnated in the face of SPS challenges in capsicum (070960), aubergines (070930)and ‘other vegetables’ (070999), being overall only 5% higher in 2018 than in 2016 (2).

Ugandan Vegetable product exports to the EU 2012-2018 (Value €)

* Note these exports largely go to Belgium from where they are potentially in large part being onward shipped to the UK

However sanitary control issues are but one dimension of the SPS challenges facing Ugandan vegetable exporters. Of more serious concern is the entry into force of requirements under the EU’s new plant health regulation for pre-export risk assessments for pests, diseases and infections which are considered a threat to agricultural production in the EU.

This new regulatory framework requires risk assessments to be carried which include detailed action plans on how the main pest, disease and infection threats are being dealt with prior to exports being allowed entry into the EU market. This is seen as essential to minimising the risks to plant health in the EU (see box).

In the absence of such comprehensive risk assessments, imports into the EU could be banned until such time as satisfactory control measures are in place. While to date capacity constraints mean the EC is not yet moving forward with the full implementation of this new regulatory requirement, Uganda would appear to be amongst those ACP vegetable exporters who are most vulnerable to pre-emptive market closures.

In this context, the possibility that under a ‘No Deal’ or ‘Hard’ Brexit the UK will move away from the EU’s increasingly strict phytosanitary control regime (which is based on pan-EU agro-climatic conditions and patterns of agricultural production) towards an autonomously determined ‘UK-Only’ phytosanitary regime, based solely on the agro-climatic conditions in the UK and associated UK patterns of agricultural production, is a distinct possibility.

This is a possibility for two main reasons, Firstly the capacity constraints the UK’s phytosanitary services will face under  a ‘No-Deal’ Brexit given the higher volume of imports which will need to be controlled and likely staffing constraints. Secondly, because moving away from the EU’s increasingly strict SPS control regime is likely to be a precondition for any US-UK trade agreement.

Any such move would be particularly significant for Uganda in areas where the UK national risk assessment for the principal pests and diseases arising in regard to imports from Uganda is far lower than is the case for the EU as a whole.

This needs to be seen in a context where in 2018 the UK accounted for fully 52.3% of total Ugandan vegetable exports to the EU28.

Against this background Ugandan vegetable exporters may wish to support the initiation of a comparative review of the UK national risk assessments and pan-EU risk assessments for the principal pests and diseases of  concern for Uganda exports, to determine to what extent there may be scope for negotiating different terms and condition for the application of phytosanitary controls on imports to the UK from Uganda under a No Deal’ or ‘Hard’ Brexit outcome to the current ongoing process of redefining the framework for UK-EU trade relations.

However there is a downside to these ‘No-Deal’ Brexit developments, namely the UK’s plans to introduce an MFN tariff regime which would set most of the import tariffs for Ugandan vegetable exports at zero (e.g. for aubergines, fresh capsicum, capers fennel, sweetcorn and other such products (falling in CN code 070999), lentils, kidney beans, other lleguminous vegetables (falling under CN code 071390), sweet potatoes, ‘other manioc’ (falling under CN code 071490).

This would see any margins of tariff preference currently enjoyed over competing suppliers disappear. These range from a 5.6% to 12.8% margin of tariff preference over 3^rd country supplier trading under standard MFN terms (e.g. India and Brazil). For Uganda the only exception is lentils where EU MFN tariffs are already zero.