- Assistant United States Trade Representative for African Affairs Constance Hamilton led a delegation to Kenya to review the trade and investment engagement. The focus of the discussion talks was on the possibility of extending the current free trade deal before AGOA ends in the next three years.
After the Biden administration froze Trump-era negotiations on the Kenya-US free trade agreement the talks were recently revived between the two governments. A fresh round of discussions were started last week between the officials between the two countries. Assistant United States Trade Representative for African Affairs Constance Hamilton led a delegation to Kenya to review the trade and investment engagement. The focus of the discussion was on  the possibility of extending the current free trade deal before AGOA ends in the next three years.
Also read;Â https://trendsnafrica.com/kenya-us-free-trade-agreement-plan-us-trade-representative-notifies-congress/
     https://trendsnafrica.com/us-kenya-trade-deal-set-for-review/
 According to the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS), Kenya ‘s export of duty-free goods to the US under the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) has  grown in value by 20 percent, marking a new record in the past seven years. The exports have exceeded the Sh50 billion mark after declining last year.
AGOA opportunities open till 2025, allows Kenya to export more than 6,000 product lines  at preferential terms, exempting them from paying tax. Textile and apparel products continue to dominate Kenya’s exports under AGOA since its inception in 2000. The textile products exports rose to Sh50.6 billion from Sh42.2 billion in 2020 to in the review period .KNBS reported that all the selected indicators under the EPZ garment and apparel subsector recorded positive growths in 2021. Capital investment rose to Sh23 billion last year against 19.1 billion in 2020 leading to employment growth.
Kenya has been trying to diversify its export basket to the US beyond apparel. Despite its efforts to increase the export volumes of tea, coffee, and edible oil to US,  the performance of these products remained low.
Also Read; Â https://trendsnafrica.com/kenya-signs-post-brexit-trade-deal-with-the-uk/
