By All Africa
With the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) that has anchored U.S-Africa relations since 2000 set to expire on September 30, prospects for extension or renewal grow increasingly slim. Nonetheless, supporters of the trade pact hold out hope that a compromise might still be attainable. Dr. Bob Wekesa from the African Centre for the Study of the United States at Wits University in South Africa, in an AllAfrica guest column outlines three possible scenarios.
Among those lobbying Congress to act are African Ambassadors in Washington, DC. The potential expiration of the legislation “is an immediate threat to millions of dollars in investment and hundreds of thousands of livelihoods across Africa and in the United States,” Solo Andry Lantosoa Rakotomalala, Madagascar’s Ambassador to the United States, told a workshop convened by the African Diplomatic.
“We simply cannot afford to overlook an entire continent by looking away and running out the clock,” writes Beth Hughes from the American Apparel & Footwear Association, one of several business organizations pressing for renewal.
