Mozambique and European Union formalize Economic Partnership Agreements (EPA)
27 April 2018
” The Mozambican government and the European Union (EU) delegation in the country are today launching the implementation plan of the Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) between six countries of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) and the EU. The formalisation comes after the agreement entered provisional application in the country on February 4, as it also did in South Africa, Botswana, Namibia, Swaziland and Lesotho.
In practice, all products originating in the associated countries enjoy exemption from EU customs duties and have free access to the EU market, with the exception of armaments. As a rule, Mozambique exports more to Europe than it imports. In 2016, EU imports from Mozambique were valued at 1.3 billion Euros, while its exports to Mozambique were worth 682 million Euros.
“Although Mozambique’s trade balance has been largely negative in recent years, its trade balance with the European Union has remained positive, mainly due to the preponderance of aluminium exports,” the European delegation said in response to questions posed by the Lusa.
Under the new partnership, “a textile product can enter the EU duty-free if at least one phase of its production, such as weaving or knitting, has occurred in one of the countries”.
Conversely, over a period of 10 years, Mozambique will gradually remove customs duties on about 74 percent of its imports from the European Union. The rest, about 26 percent of the volume of imports, was excluded “for reasons of food safety, industrial sensitivity or tax revenue, including industrial and agricultural products”.
Source: Lusa ”