The European Union plans to sign an Economic Partnership Agreement(EPA) with Kenya, leaving out the rest of East African Counties that have failed to ratify the trade deal.
According to Valdis Dombrovskis, the block’s executive vice-president and trade commissioner, the European trading block will first sign the agreement with Kenya as other EAC counties wait for ratification.
The EPA agreement was concluded seven years ago but had not come into life due to lack of signatures from other EAC counties. Kenya has already signed the regional EPA and ratified it.
The official spoke in Brussels after meeting a Kenyan trade delegation led by Industrialisation, Trade and Enterprise Development CS Betty Maina and East African Community and Regional Development CS Adan Mohamed, who had accompanied President Uhuru Kenyatta during his official visit to the European Union seat.
Kenya and Rwanda were the only two countries in the region to sign the EPA in 2016 after Tanzania, Uganda, and Burundi refused to endorse it, forcing Nairobi to have a temporary arrangement with the Europeans to allow its goods duty-free access to the vast market.
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