fresh vegetables, loose and packed

2.1 Sub-Saharan Africa’s geographic location dictates that most of its hard-currency NTAEs will be aimed at Europe, and particularly at the affluent markets of the EU and EFTA countries. Middle Eastern markets are relevant to Eastern and Southern African countries, but their smaller size as well as competition from Mediterranean, Indian and Southeast Asian suppliers greatly limits the growth potential of such outlets for SSA products. The region's distance (as reflected in airfreight rates and sea transit times) from potentially lucrative markets such as the United States (particularly attractive under AGOA), Canada, Japan and Australia, as well as the availability of products from alternative suppliers, also removes any a priori competitive advantage that SSA may have in these markets. Eastern Europe is undoubtedly a growth area as economies develop and stabilize, but the fragility of consumer buying power currently renders the market unreliable and of limited relevance to sustainable growth, as made evident by the collapse of Russian rose imports from Kenya in the late 90's. Consequently, the emphasis for NTAE development analysis and forecasts – and thus of this study as well -- must be on the EU market itself.

2.2 This is not to denigrate the regional market for both intra-SSA trade and trade between SSA and the Maghreb countries. For example, the Republic of South Africa (RSA) exports citrus, top fruit, stone fruit and grapes to its immediate and more distant neighbors such as Kenya and the Sahelian and West African coastal countries. Kenya exports avocados to RSA, while Mali and Niger maintain an active trade in onions to coastal countries such as Ivory Coast, Senegal and Nigeria. Burkina Faso and Mali distribute their mango crops into Mauritania and Niger, and sometimes even to Libya and Algeria, while Cote d'Ivoire supplies bananas to its more arid neighbors. The potential for such trade is little known in donor circles and it tends to be informal and sporadic, rather than conducted along well-established formal-sector circuits, as is the case for exports to the EU.

2.3 Though it is outside the scope of the present study, intraregional trade should not be overlooked during subsequent analysis of the topic. Indeed, the potential for the regional trade in NTAEs to benefit from donor investments could well be inversely proportional to its current degree of development, if one accepts that natural growth in consumption of these products should increase effective demand in the importing countries.

Table 1: Value of non-EU fruits and vegetables imported to the EU

Graph 1: Fruit imports to the EU in 2000  (8,246,879 tons)

‘000 