Trade access issues in Africa and the Caribbean persist. The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) is conducting annual reviews of the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) and the Caribbean Basin Initiative (CBI).
African Growth and Opportunity Act
AGOA provides favorable access to the U.S. market for products from some 30 African nations. Although those nations are supposed to also open their markets to U.S. products, the U.S. Meat Export Federation (USMEF) explained in comments filed with USTR that some of those nations maintain significant trade obstacles for U.S. red meat.
“Starting with South Africa, it’s very difficult to ship pork variety meats in there from the U.S., and there’s also a lot of non-science based restrictions around pork muscle cuts,” says USMEF President and CEO Dan Halstrom. “In addition, the third item is there’s no access for processed pork products into South Africa.”
On the pork side, Halstrom says there is immediate opportunity if the U.S. were to get some of these restrictions lifted. For example, something as simple as pork hearts could turn into 300-400 metric tons a month overnight.
Halstrom points out that beef has better access into South Africa. However, the tariff rate is still high, exceeding 30% for most of the beef muscle cuts.
The situation in Nigeria is even worse; the country is completely closed to fresh and frozen U.S. red meat — beef and pork, Halstrom notes.
“We currently only have access into Nigeria for U.S. pork processed meats, sausages, in particular,” he says.
AGOA is set to expire Sept. 30 unless Congress takes action to renew the program, Halstrom says.
Caribbean Basin Initiative
A similar trade preferences program for the Caribbean is also under review by USTR.
USMEF has filed comments regarding access under the CBI, urging USTR to consider market access barriers when evaluating whether to recommend any country as a CBI beneficiary. Halstrom says Jamaica’s longstanding ban on U.S. pork and high tariffs on imported beef and pork is of particular interest.
“The U.S. pork industry, and USMEF as well, has been working closely with Post for years to try to open this market, and so far, we haven’t had a lot of success,” Halstrom says. “This is a good opportunity under the CBI to finally make an impact here and really leverage Jamaica into following science and getting some access for U.S. pork products.”
USTR will submit a report to Congress on the CBI by the end of this year.
