South Africa

<p>The SADC regional component of the Africa Trade Competitiveness and Market Access (ATCMA) programme, funded by the European Union, aims to enhance livelihoods, employment, and economic growth by increasing sustainable intra-African and EU-Africa trade. Implemented by the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) and the International Trade Centre (ITC) in close partnership with the SADC Secretariat, this ATCMA &nbsp;component focuses on boosting African SMEs&apos; trade competitiveness and expanding their market access.</p><p>The Programme will facilitate intra-African trade, strengthen regional quality infrastructure, and support a green transition through a holistic value chain approach. The initiative will benefit export-oriented SMEs, with a focus on women and youth-led businesses, ensuring value addition, regulatory improvements, and enhanced trade competitiveness. The programme will align with existing ATCMA components including EAC, COMESA, ECCAS, and ECOWAS &nbsp;and other regional initiatives to maximize impact.</p>

<p>The United Kingdom Trade Partnerships (UKTP) Programme aims to increase trade from developing countries to the United Kingdom (UK) and the European Union (EU) by maximizing the benefits of UK and EU Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) and the UK&apos;s Developing Countries Trading Scheme (DCTS). The UKTP Programme works in partnership with government agencies, private sector organisations, public sector institutions, small and medium-sized enterprises and other local stakeholders.&nbsp;</p><p>The UKTP Programme is funded by the Foreign, Commonwealth &amp; Development Office (FCDO) of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland under the UK&apos;s Trade Centre of Expertise. EPA and DCTS countries participating in the UKTP Programme will have access to high quality trade-related technical assistance through sector initiatives. Target beneficiaries will be export-ready SMEs that are committed to securing new trade opportunities with the UK. This project will aim to promote exports through facilitating access to markets, providing advisory services to SMEs to improve their products and business operations, and strengthening business support organizations.&nbsp;</p><p>This project builds upon the lessons learnt and achievements of the UKTP programme since 2019. Previous engagement with SMEs in multiple EPA countries has shown the benefit of selecting export-ready companies with compelling products for UK customers and consumers to participate and of preparing them specifically with UK market entry services to succeed in the UK market.&nbsp;</p><p>This project complements and works in synergy with UKTP in the Pacific. &nbsp; &nbsp;</p>

The Project Empowering women and boosting livelihoods through agricultural trade: Leveraging the AfCFTA Phase II contributes to ITC’s Strategic Plan in relation to gender equality and regional integration, in particular ITC Gender Moon Shot and One Trade Africa Strategy, as well as the FAO strategy to support the AfCFTA. 

Building on results achieved in Phase I, this project aims to empower women producers, processors, and informal and formal traders in agriculture and agro-processing value chains as well as agriculture women-led MSMEs to benefit from trade opportunities created by the AfCFTA through capacity-building, policy research and policy dialogues. The project contributes to ITC and FAO’s ongoing support to the implementation of the AfCFTA.