Inside Trade

September 22, 2025

Africa and The Middle East

State official: Updated AGOA should boost ‘reciprocity’ between U.S., Africa

A renewed African Growth and Opportunity Act must ensure greater trade “reciprocity” between the U.S. and countries in Africa, a senior State Department official said on Tuesday. During a May 20 press briefing , Troy Fitrell, senior official at State’s African Affairs Bureau, said he is “big fan of AGOA,” but added that the trade-preference program should be updated to “reflect the modern world rather than the one from 25 years ago when it was first founded.” While the program,...

Analyst: AGOA has failed to live up to its potential to boost development in Africa

The African Growth and Opportunity Act has not fulfilled its potential to significantly boost the continent’s development and manufacturing capabilities, says a longtime Africa analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Cameron Hudson, senior fellow at CSIS’ Africa Program and a former director for African affairs at the National Security Council, says the original purpose behind AGOA, a unilateral trade-preference program set to expire at the end of September, has been lost. “Africa has not turned this program...

MC14 roadmap shows preference for short ministerial, more Geneva work

World Trade Organization members want the 14th ministerial conference to last only a few days, without extensions, and to provide ample time for ministers to discuss pressing issues, especially reform, as opposed to pushing to conclude negotiations held over from work in Geneva, according to a roadmap put together by the WTO director-general. Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala circulated a “Road to Yaoundé MC14” document to WTO members on Wednesday during the Trade Negotiations Committee meeting; a copy was obtained by Inside...

AfCFTA secretary general: AGOA ‘no longer alive’

The Trump administration's new baseline 10 percent tariff regime effectively “nullifies” the African Growth and Opportunity Act, the head of the African Continental Free Trade Area said this week, calling on African countries to seek out alternatives to the U.S. In an April 22 interview with CNBC Africa , AfCFTA Secretary General Wamkele Mene said the Trump administration’s trade policies signal the U.S. is no longer interested in extending preferential treatment to AGOA beneficiaries. AfCFTA is a developing continent-wide free...

Ex-Im revives $4.7 billion LNG pipeline loan stalled since 2021

The U.S. Export-Import Bank is opening the door for resumed work on a liquefied natural gas pipeline in Mozambique that Ex-Im first financed through a $4.7 billion loan in 2019, after the developer abandoned it in 2021 following Islamic State attacks in the area -- underlining the Trump administration’s focus on expanding U.S. fossil fuel companies’ exports and overseas development. According to a March 19 statement , the bank’s board of directors -- including two acting officials newly appointed by...

Six House Republicans call for revoking South Africa’s AGOA benefits

President Trump should revoke South Africa’s duty-free access to the U.S. market under the African Growth and Opportunity Act and suspend diplomatic ties, six House Republicans argued this week, citing alleged human rights abuses, a “vendetta” against Israel and the country’s relationship with China. In a Feb. 11 letter to Trump , the six lawmakers repeatedly praised the president’s approach to international relations and framed action against South Africa as another step in that approach. “South Africa is simply not...

Wyden: Greer called AGOA ‘a giveaway’

Jamieson Greer, President Trump’s pick to serve as U.S. Trade Representative, has called the African Growth and Opportunity Act “a giveaway” and suggested that trade-preference programs like AGOA are not beneficial to the U.S. because they are “non-reciprocal,” according to Senate Finance Committee ranking member Ron Wyden (D-OR). In questions for the record following Greer’s confirmation hearing before Finance last week, Wyden cited “meetings with staff” in asserting that Greer had “remarked that preference programs do not seem to have...

Warnock: AGOA a ‘net positive’ for U.S., shouldn’t be undervalued

The African Growth and Opportunity Act is critical to ensuring the U.S. does not give up influence in African countries to China, according to Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA), who says the future of the trade-preference program is among his top priorities as ranking member of the Senate Finance trade subcommittee. The new lead Democrat on the panel spoke with Inside U.S. Trade about his trade priorities on Thursday outside the Finance Committee’s confirmation hearing for Jamieson Greer, President Trump’s...

Carnegie Africa program director: U.S. should ‘rebrand’ AGOA under Trump

Congress and the Trump administration should renew and “rebrand” the African Growth and Opportunity Act to make it more “clearly beneficial” for the U.S., the head of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace’s Africa Program said on Thursday. During a Jan. 30 panel discussion , Zainab Usman, also a senior fellow at Carnegie, discussed how the U.S. can improve the U.S.-Africa economic relationship, the subject of a Carnegie report published last month. The Trump administration has signaled that “trade relationships...

Kenya’s president raises STIP talks in first call with Rubio

Kenyan President William Ruto on Monday said he spoke with Secretary of State Marco Rubio about a “need to conclude” a bilateral trade arrangement launched under the Biden administration. “I have had a telephone conversation with United States Secretary of State Marco Rubio on a variety of issues of mutual concern for our two countries,” Ruto said in a social media post . “We discussed the need to conclude the Strategic Trade and Investment Partnership (STIP) agreement that seeks to...

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