The East Africa Community (EAC) Secretariat convened an expert meeting on 9^th and 10^th may 2022 on the African Continental Free Trade Area negotiations on trade in services.

The meeting, in line with the negotiations for the EAC Partner States under the Phase 1 of Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) negotiations on elimination of restrictions to enhance services trade, reviewed the draft schedule of commitments on services for the EAC Partner States to the AfCFTA State Parties.

The experts reviewed and aligned the comments received from other AfCFTA State Parties on what the EAC had proposed as their commitments. Usually, the list the sectors that a country intends to open up (eliminate restrictions) to other parties to a free trade area undergoes negotiations (give and take) by other parties. The negotiations include a scrutiny on the limitations on market access by other parties and any national treatment accorded to the locals. The experts also reviewed the verification reports on specific schedule of commitments.

The AfCFTA State Parties agreed to begin with the liberalization of five priority service sectors to facilitate and operationalize the free trade area. The five-priority sector include Business services, Communication services, Financial services, Tourism and travel and Transport.

The draft schedule of commitment will be submitted to the AfCFTA secretariat as the EAC offers. Notably, all the State Parties under the AfCFTA are liberalizing their services sectors WTO (GATS) plus. Meaning, they cannot liberalize less to what they committed under the multilateral system.

Please liaise with Mr. Davilyne Busuru on dbusuru@kepsa.o.ke to access the whole draft schedule of service commitment and for further interpretation of the schedule.