South Africa aims for regional free trade deal by next year

South African members of parliament were asked Wednesday to ratify a regional free trade deal so it could come into effect at the start of next year. Reuters quoted Sifiso Ngwenya, director of Southern African trade relations, as saying: "Our objective is to implement the free trade agreement on 1 January, 2000." The proposed agreement which was tabled in parliament earlier this month, covers an estimated US $6 billion of trade between South Africa and the other 13 members of the Southern African Development Community (SADC). In terms of the proposed agreement South Africa, Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia and Swaziland which form the Southern African Customs Union (SACU) would drop import tariffs to zero within five years. Other SADC members- Mauritius, Tanzania, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Angola and the Seychelles - would phase out their tariffs on SACU imports over eight years.