Rob Davies’ AGOA mess-up will cost thousands of agri jobs
Late yesterday, US President Barack Obama informed Congress of his intention to suspend South Africa’s AGOA benefits for all agricultural products. This will affect roughly R2.4 billion of annual agricultural exports, covering products such as wine, fruit juice, citrus fruit, pulp and more. The consequences for farmers and farmworkers is profoundly negative- in a year in which they are already suffering the effects of a devastating drought.
The reason this has happened is plain and simple: Minister Rob Davies has had months of warnings and reminders to honour the commitments made to the USA on market access for chicken, pork and beef, but has failed to do so. This mess-up has happened on his watch, and its consequences are entirely on his hands. The loss of AGOA benefits for agricultural products will cost thousands of jobs in the agricultural sector.
This announcement comes just 3 days after Minister Davies told the DTI Portfolio Committee in Parliament that “AGOA is secure” and that South Africa had met all of the commitments made to the US earlier this year. He was clearly misinformed, or was not being completely frank with the Committee.
I have written to the Committee Chairperson today to ask that Minister Davies come back to the Committee urgently to correct his earlier briefing, and to set out his plan to fix this mess. I have also written to the Speaker of the National Assembly (NA), Baleka Mbete, requesting that she schedules a debate of public importance next week, in terms of Rule 103 of Parliament, to debate this suspension, and to give the Minister an opportunity to explain to Parliament and the country exactly how this mess-up happened on his watch.