Uganda is no longer a beneficiary\u00a0of the African Growth and Opportunity Act (Agoa), after the United States struck the country off at the end of December.\u00a0**<\/p>\n
The United States also removed three other African countries, the Central African Republic, Gabon, and Niger, from Agoa, effective from January 1.<\/p>\n
The decree by US President Joe Biden on December 29 will effectively end Kampala’s ability to export certain commodities to the US without added tax.<\/p>\n
It could have a serious impact on the Ugandan economy, which has significantly benefited from the programme since its establishment in 2000.<\/p>\n
The decision was made after Uganda passed its controversial Anti-Homosexuality Act last year, a law which could impose life imprisonment or even the death penalty for same sex conduct.<\/p>\n
In October, Biden said that Uganda’s removal from Agoa was due to “gross violations of internationally recognised human rights.”<\/p>\n
“Despite intensive engagement between the United States and the Central African Republic, Gabon, Niger, and Uganda, these countries have failed to address United States concerns about their non-compliance with the Agoa eligibility criteria,” Biden said in a letter to the speaker of the US House of Representatives.<\/p>\n
Agoa gives eligible sub-Saharan African countries duty-free access to the US for more than 1,800 products.<\/p>\n
It is set to expire in December 2025, although the US has signalled intentions to extend it.<\/p>\n
Under the deal, Uganda has mostly exported agriculture goods, as well as textiles, duty-free to the United States.<\/p>\n
Over 80 per cent of the East African country’s exports to the US were from the agricultural sector, which employs about 72 percent of the workforce.<\/p>\n
Its expulsion from Agoa could now lead to thousands of job losses, and a decline in economic growth.<\/p>\n
In the 12 months to June 2023, Uganda\u2019s exports to the US under Agoa amounted to $8.2 million, about 11.5 percent of its total exports to the US in the same period, totalling\u00a0$70.7 million.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Uganda is no longer a beneficiary\u00a0of the African Growth and Opportunity Act (Agoa), after the United States struck the country off at the end of December.\u00a0** The United States also removed three other African countries, the Central African Republic, Gabon, and Niger, from Agoa, effective from January 1. The decree by US President Joe Biden […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9695,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":10,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"source_name":"Africa News","source_url":"","via_name":"","via_url":"","override_template":"0","override":[{"template":"1","single_blog_custom":"","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_share_counter":"0","show_view_counter":"0","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author":"0","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_category":"0","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_prev_next_post":"0","show_popup_post":"0","number_popup_post":"1","show_author_box":"0","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"1"}],"override_image_size":"0","image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post":"0","trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post":"0","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","sponsored_post_name":"","sponsored_post_url":"","sponsored_post_logo_enable":"0","sponsored_post_logo":"","sponsored_post_desc":"","disable_ad":"0"},"jnews_primary_category":{"id":"","hide":""},"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"override_view_counter":"0","view_counter_number":"0","override_share_counter":"0","share_counter_number":"0","override_like_counter":"0","like_counter_number":"0","override_dislike_counter":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[29,32],"tags":[1926,1925,132,385],"class_list":["post-10408","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-east-africa","category-economy","tag-african-growth-and-opportunity-act","tag-agoa","tag-uganda","tag-united-states"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10408","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10408"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10408\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9695"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10408"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10408"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10408"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}