Africa is set diversify its exports to
the United States through the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) after
the African Development Bank (AfDB) on Monday announced plans to help boost trade
and investments under the initiative.
AfDB Manager for Regional Integration
and Trade Moono Mupotola said the bank has launched several bilateral meetings
with U. S. and multilateral companies on ways of helping African countries to
broaden AGOA export prospects.
"There is growing political will
within the Bank to help boost U. S.-Africa trade relations, in accordance with
the general spirit to boost African trade as agreed by African Heads of
Government during the 18th and 19th sessions of the Summit of Heads of States
and Governments," said Mupotola in a statement received in Nairobi.
He said AGOA, together with the Trade
and Investment Framework Agreements, are considered critical tools of U.
S.-Africa trade relations.
The regional bank has identified
several areas of possible support to be discussed with U. S. government
agencies and African countries at the AGOA XII Forum that will be held in the
Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa in the summer.
AGOA is a preferential market access
system given to specific countries in Africa and the Caribbean by the United
States, where Kenya's apparel exports expected to grow by at least 6 percent in
2012.
Assistant Director of the Ministry of
Trade Lornah Okumu told Xinhua recently that in 2011, the country's textile exports
to the United States amounted to 298 million U. S. dollars.
"Our current projection is that
textile and apparel exports will grow by at least 6 percent in 2012 to top 315
million dollars, " Okumu said.
She noted that most of the exports
enter the U.S. markets under the preferential Africa-U.S. trade agreement.
According to the ministry of trade, the total value of Kenya and U.S. bilateral
trade in 2011 was approximately 830 million dollars.
Xinhua
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