Announcement

COMESA Launches its Customs Union at Heads of State Summit

 | Wednesday, July 15, 2009

USAID/East Africa’s regional partner, Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA), held its Heads of State and Government Summit in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, June 7-8. Eight heads of state attended from Zimbabwe, Swaziland, Kenya, Uganda, Sudan, Djibouti, Seychelles, and Zambia, and other countries were represented by senior government officials from COMESA's 19 Member States. Zimbabwean President Mugabe assumed the chairmanship of COMESA for the next year. USAID/EA's Regional Economic Growth and Integration Director and  Regional Trade Policy Specialist attended this meeting.

Key Decisions Made:

• Leaders from COMESA launched a Customs Union (CU) and a regional payment and settlement system. A CU is a merger of two or more customs territories (e.g. a country) which applies common custom rules, procedures and taxes relating to the importation or exportation of goods. All COMESA Member States are disposed to join the CU during a transition period of three to five years. Eight countries are said to be ready to join immediately. This is an important step in economic integration considering that nine countries joined the Free Trade Area in 2000 and the number has since grown to 14 countries;
• COMESA delegates reiterated their commitment to merging with other regional economic communities (RECs), namely the East African Community (EAC) and the Southern African Development Community (SADC) to form a grand Free Trade Area that will include 26 countries in eastern and southern Africa including Indian Ocean Islands;
• Although economic integration dominated the meeting agenda, infrastructure development and climate change were recurring themes;
•  The summit recognized and expressed concern over pockets of instability within the region; 
• The summit declined to recognize the current government in Madagascar because it came to power by overthrowing a democratically elected government; and
•  The summit approved the development of a program on public health.