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Business Reporter
COUNTRIES within the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa) have called for a socioeconomic study on the impact of Covid-19 to establish containment and recovery strategies. The request was made by principal secretaries from ministries that coordinate Comesa regional integration programmes during the trading bloc’s intergovernmental committee meeting held in Zambia via video conferencing on Tuesday.

“Comesa has asked the Secretariat to conduct a socioeconomic study on the effects of the Coronavirus to inform ongoing Covid-19 containment measures and recovery strategies.

“The meeting was called to consider a raft of regional guidelines that will enable a coordinated approach in responding to Covid-19,” reads the update issued after the meeting.

Intra and extra-Comesa trade has been negatively affected by the measures that countries in the region have put in place, which differ in extent and severity.

During the inter-governmental meeting, delegates acknowledged that some of the measures were not coordinated at a regional level thus seriously limiting regional trade, which involves essential commodities that are in demand. As a result of the above, Comesa said it was important to embrace a coordinated approach that would ensure the measures individual countries put in place are harmonised across the region to facilitate the fl ow of essential goods and services.

“Given the multiple membership of countries to regional economic blocs: Comesa, the East African Community and the Southern Africa Development Community, the delegates endorsed the development of guidelines that will provide a coordinated approach across the region,” said the block.

A draft set of guidelines, which was developed by trade and customs experts from member states was discussed by the principal secretaries for their endorsement before they are presented to the Council of Ministers tomorrow for adoption and subsequent implementation.

Addressing the delegates during the meeting, Comesa secretary general Ms Chileshe Kapwepwe said a cooperative effort on the part of all countries is needed as the world has become interconnected through technology, production and travel.

“In addition to coordinated efforts, a uniform application of measures is paramount at a regional level to ensure continued trade and supply of goods and services while attending to the imperatives of public health,” she said.

Ms Kapwepwe told the principal secretaries that regional countries were experiencing mixed fortunes in Covid-19 infections.

“Even if the world will eventually succeed to contain this pandemic, tremendous amounts of resources will have been deployed for this purpose and economies will have shrunk owing to subdued activity as countries try to halt the spread of the virus,” said the Comesa secretary general.

She added that the secretariat will be coordinating efforts by member States to develop recovery plans to ensure the gains already made in regional integration are not totally eroded.

During the meeting, the Comesa secretariat presented a proposal to review its budget downwards considering that most of the activities have been scaled down as a result of Covid-19 pandemic. Th is will translate to less contributions by member states to the annual budget of the 21-member bloc.