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GUESTS: Katherine Daniels, Trade Policy Advisor with Oxfam, Viji Rangaswami, Associate with the Trade Equity and Development Project with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

The US Congress has just amended and extended the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) that allows 38 African countries to export goods to the US market. AGOA was enacted in 2000, to provide duty-free access to the US for many African products. The act was crafted to encourage African countries to open their economies and build free markets. However AGOA only specifies the elimination of US trade barriers to African goods. AGOA was set to expire this year but now it has been extended to 2015. Congress also extended the third-country fabric provision of AGOA until 2013, allowing eligible African countries to export apparel to the US even if the fabric came from another country.

Apparels TriStar is Uganda’s flagship company exporting garments to the US market under AGOA. Free Speech Radio News Correspondent Joshua Kyalimpa filed a report this past Monday about workers rights violations in Tristar.