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Unmaking of a Customs Union: Regional (Dis)integration in the East African Community

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2021

Jakob Rauschendorfer Open the ORCID record for Jakob Rauschendorfer [Opens in a new window]  and
Anna Twum Open the ORCID record for Anna Twum [Opens in a new window]
Jakob Rauschendorfer*
Affiliation:
International Growth Centre, Uganda
Anna Twum
Affiliation:
International Growth Centre, Rwanda
*
*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

The Common External Tariff (CET) of the East African Community (EAC) customs union has long been considered the cornerstone of the most successful example of regional integration in Sub-Saharan Africa. In this paper, we assess the implementation of the EAC-CET using a novel dataset of country- and firm-level deviations from the common tariff regime constructed by digitizing information in gazettes published by the Secretariat of the EAC between 2009 and 2019. Employing these data, we present five patterns on EAC tariff policy: (i) increased usage of country-level deviations from the common tariff regime render the EAC-CET less and less ‘common’; (ii) Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda predominantly use unilateral deviations to increase external protection while Rwanda mostly decreases tariffs; (iii) Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda increase tariffs for the same classes of products, but target different industries; (iv) unilateral tariff reductions at the country level are mostly used to facilitate access to inputs; (v) data on firm-level exemptions suggest that private sector development in the EAC would benefit from lower tariffs on intermediate inputs. Our findings demonstrate an incipient but clear trend in the EAC away from a communal tariff regime and towards national and more protectionist trade policies.

Keywords

Regional integrationTariffsAfricainternational trade
Type
Original Article
Information
World Trade Review , Volume 21 , Issue 1 , February 2022 , pp. 59 - 70
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press

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