The UK has announced changes to its Developing Countries Trading Scheme (DCTS), designed to simplify access to the British market for developing countries, not least those in Africa, and thereby strengthen economic ties between them and the UK. The DCTS covers 65 countries and grants them zero or reduced tariffs on thousands of their export products; it was introduced after the UK left the EU, and is Britain’s flagship trade preference scheme.

Last year, African countries exported to the UK goods with a total value of £3.2-billion.

“The world is changing,” pointed out UK Development Minister (equivalent to Deputy Minister in South Africa) Jenny Chapman (Baroness Chapman of Darlington). “Countries in the Global South want a different relationship with the UK as a trading partner and investor, not as a donor. These new rules will make it easier for developing countries to trade more closely with the UK. This is good for their economies and for UK consumers and businesses.”

Among the improvements in the scheme were simplified rules of origin. These would allow African countries, including those with more developed economies, such as Nigeria, to source inputs for their finished products from across the continent. Such final products would continue to have zero-tariff access to the British market. This was intended to promote trade between African countries, as well as between Africa and the UK.

“No country has ever lifted itself out of poverty without trading with its neighbours,” highlighted UK Trade Policy Minister Douglas Alexander. “Over recent decades trade has been an essential ingredient in lifting hundreds of millions of people out of poverty around the globe.”

The UK has simultaneously launched two other initiatives to assist African exporters. One is to provide targeted support to African exporters, to help them meet UK standards and navigate British customs procedures. The other is to facilitate the trade in services for partner countries, through the strengthening of future trade deals. Such services will include digital, financial and legal services.

All these changes form part of the wider UK Trade for Development policy. This aims to assist economic growth in partner countries while also enabling British businesses and consumers to acquire affordable but high-quality products.

The new measures are also in line with the new UK Trade Strategy, which focuses on growth by means of global partnerships and “future-facing markets”.