Category: Eastern African

Lack of UK IT Systems for Organic Imports Poses Challenges for ACP Fresh Produce Exporters

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Summary
The UK’s reversion to paper based organic product documentation is generating additional costs and value losses for ACP organic exporters. This takes the form of increased internal administrative costs and value losses resulting from misplaced or delayed documentation.  These problems are particularly severe for small volume exports of mixed organic products. Bulk exports of single organic products are less severely affected, since additional costs are lower and there is less risk of document loss. Political relations between the EU and UK around Brexit related trade issues would appear to be such as to rule out any arrangements which might allow a temporary restoration of UK access to EU IT systems used for trade in organic products until such time as UK systems are fully in place. Read more “Lack of UK IT Systems for Organic Imports Poses Challenges for ACP Fresh Produce Exporters”

Brexit Costs Are Leading to a Restructuring of UK to EU Supply Chains

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Summary
Brexit related cost increases are beginning give rise to a restructuring of supply chains to avoid crossing the UK/EU border. While analysis to date focusses on the impact on the UK livestock products sector, serious disruptions to ACP triangular supply chains for the delivery of fruit and vegetables to EU markets via the UK area also being impacted. This is in part a result of the phytosanitary certification and phytosanitary import control requirements not faced by re-exported ACP products. There is a need to take practical steps to address these phytosanitary related challenges, so as to avoid undermining export opportunities for a range of smaller ACP agri-food exporters. These exporters faced particular challenges because of the ‘thin’ nature of the EU/UK trade agreement, which has left important phytosanitary issues unaddressed. Read more “Brexit Costs Are Leading to a Restructuring of UK to EU Supply Chains”

Deadline for Transposition of EU UTP Regulation into National Law Passes but Major Questions Related to UTPs Remain

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Summary
The EU UTPS regulation has not been transposed into member states national law, but with uneven results. Ensuring common standards of enforcement to uphold minimum EU requirements for removing UTPS in agri-food supply chins is no essential. Equally there is an urgent need to ensure enforcement mechanisms recognise the realities of ACP-to-EU supply chains and actively prevent the adoption of commercial practices between importers and exporters which de facto circumvent the intention of EU UTP regulations in regard to 3rd country-EU supply chains. Read more “Deadline for Transposition of EU UTP Regulation into National Law Passes but Major Questions Related to UTPs Remain”

The Sea Freight Reefer Constraint on ACP Perishable Exports Compounds Brexit Complications

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Summary
A shortage of refrigerated containers, and an in-balance in their geographical distribution is seeing raising reefer freight costs and a rescheduling of shipping services to seek to address the in-balance. This could potentially carry costs for smaller ACP exporters of perishable product exports to Europe. This situation is complicating efforts to deal with cost increasing effects of the rules of origin/MFN tariff complication and phytosanitary certification requirements for perishable products shipped along triangular supply chains, through re-routing such to direct shipment to either the UK or EU market. Read more “The Sea Freight Reefer Constraint on ACP Perishable Exports Compounds Brexit Complications”

EU/UK Cross Border Trade Picking Up but Impact on ACP Triangular Supply Chains Remains Un-Addressed

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Summary
While recovery in UK exports to the EU is underway after unprecedented declines in January 2021, the recovery in EU exports to the UK is less pronounced, with trade still down significantly compared to 2020. No data is available on the impact this is having on ACP goods shipped along triangular supply chains. However, the need to get to grips at the policy level with the sources of cost increases along triangular supply chains has bene given a new urgency by the UK’s Covid-19 linked ‘red list’ of countries subject to restrictions on entry to the UK. Read more “EU/UK Cross Border Trade Picking Up but Impact on ACP Triangular Supply Chains Remains Un-Addressed”

Can Evolving EU UK Technical Discussions on Northern Ireland Trade Issues Help Ease Triangular Supply Chain Challenges?

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Summary
EU/UK technical discussions on solutions which could facilitate agri-food sector trade between the mainland UK and Northern Ireland, within the framework of the mutually agreed Northern Ireland protocol, could offer hope for solutions to the wider challenges now faced along ACP triangular supply chains.  However, any progress on these technical issues would leave unaddressed the issue of the MFN tariffs now levied on ACP exports to final markets where the shipment arrangements require these goods to cross and EU/UK border outside of customs supervision.  This issue needs to be addressed unilaterally by the UK through the adoption of practical trade documentation requirements if the commitments to continuity in market access for ACP exports is to be fully upheld. Parallel unilateral action is also required from the EU. Read more “Can Evolving EU UK Technical Discussions on Northern Ireland Trade Issues Help Ease Triangular Supply Chain Challenges?”

The UK Trade and Business Commission Offers Opportunities for Highlighting ACP Triangular Supply Chain Concerns

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Summary
A UK Trade and Business Commission consisting of cross-party Parliamentary and business representation has been launched. The aim is to review the UK’s new trade agreements and offer evidence-based recommendation for improvements which could facilitate frictionless trade. Given the Commission’s focus on food supply chains and the new rules of origin and SPS complications which have arisen since 1 January 2021, this initiative could offer an opportunity to raise the profile of ACP agri-food sector trade concerns linked to the Brexit process and advance practical solutions for the renewal of frictionless trade along ACP triangular supply chains used to serve markets in both the UK and EU. Read more “The UK Trade and Business Commission Offers Opportunities for Highlighting ACP Triangular Supply Chain Concerns”

The Implications of the EUs More Assertive Trade Policy: The EU Trade Policy Review Part 2

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Summary
The EC is proposing a ‘more assertive’ trade policy, emphasising the need for partner countries to fully live up to commitments entered into under trade agreements their governments have signed on to. There are concerns the more assertive promotion of EU trade and economic interests will dominate other EU trade policy objectives. The EC’s ‘Open Strategic Autonomy’ concept seeks to reconcile the EU’s ‘managed trade’ import regime applied in sensitive agri-food sector, with the need for more open markets for EU exporters. There is a contradiction at the heart of EU agri-food sector trade policy, with the EC seeking to deny ACP EPA signatories the right to use trade policy tools to regulate imports in trade with the EU which the EC itself routinely uses to manage imports from other major agri-food sector competitors. This contradiction is likely to come to the fore in the coming years as the EC seeks to operationalise its ‘more assertive’ trade policy. This will be especially the case if the application of full UK border controls on goods crossing from the EU, generate the kinds of agri-food sector disruptions which have affected UK exporters since 1 January 2021. This could then see surges in EU exports to ACP markets for livestock products such as poultry meat and milk powders. Read more “The Implications of the EUs More Assertive Trade Policy: The EU Trade Policy Review Part 2”

East African Air Freighted Horticulture and Floriculture Exports to UK facing Devastation Given UK ‘Red List’ Travel Restrictions

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Summary
The UK’s new Covid-19 linked ‘red list’ travel restrictions threatens to undermine a nascent recovery in passenger-based air freight services from Eastern Africa to the UK. While the public health measures are understandable, they need to be seen in the context of new Brexit trade complications for air freighted fresh produce. This threatens to put Eastern African fresh produce exporters at a competitive disadvantage vis a vis competitors in major product areas such as fresh beans and cut flowers. It gives an added urgency to the promotion of unilateral UK initiatives to resolve the new rules of origin complications on ACP exports shipped to the UK market via the EU.  Read more “East African Air Freighted Horticulture and Floriculture Exports to UK facing Devastation Given UK ‘Red List’ Travel Restrictions”

UK Parliamentary Report Reviews Operational Shortcomings of EU/UK TCA and Highlights Rules of Origin Problems Faced by ACP Re-Exports

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Summary
While the House of Lords European Union Committee highlights the substantive unresolved issues under the EU/UK TCA, the focus is on the impact on UK businesses. While the impact on developing countries is referred to, this analysis is underdeveloped. A significant number of ACP supply chains are being affected.  The new rules of origin complication is a particular area of concern, with ACP exporters being caught up in this new trade challenge.  The affected ACP exports range from fresh horticulture, floriculture, and fisheries products, through the onward trade in ACP semi-processed products to ACP sugar exports. A solution to the rules of origin complication at the EU/UK level is unlikely.  There is however scope for a solution for ACP exports shipped to the UK via the EU through the kind of UK pragmatic unilateral action which the Committee has called for and which the UK government is nominally open to. Coordinated action by ACP governments and business bodies to secure such unilateral pragmatic UK solutions in trade with the UK would appear urgent, given the scale of total ACP exports potentially facing export market losses. Read more “UK Parliamentary Report Reviews Operational Shortcomings of EU/UK TCA and Highlights Rules of Origin Problems Faced by ACP Re-Exports”