Rome – The East African Community (EAC) has launched a campaign aimed at creating awareness of the agricultural export trade opportunities that have been created through the European Union-EAC Market Access Update Program (Markup), a initiative which, in addition to the EAC and the EU, also sees the collaboration of the German government and other development partners, including the International Trade Centre, the United Nations Organization for Industrial Development, Uganda Coffee Development Authority, Solidaridad East Africa, Oxfam and the Institute for University Cooperation.
“The ‘Markup: Growing agri-food export markets’ campaign aims to raise awareness of the opportunities in agricultural trade and demonstrate that international markets are within the reach of East African exporters,” said Flavia Busingye, Acting Director of Customs at the Secretariat of the Eac, at the launch of the campaign. According to Busingye, since its inception in 2018, Markup has generated useful resources for the growth of agri-food exports in five EAC partner states, namely Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Uganda and Tanzania.
Through the campaign, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the agricultural value chain, cooperatives and farmers, as well as government bodies in the EAC, will have access to information and tools on agricultural exports. The program has generated important resources such as the EAC Quality Portal, the Funding Portal, the Burundi Trade Information Portal, as well as market studies, practical guides and manuals, participating in the harmonization of standards and frameworks for trade intra-regional food products.