South Africa and China have made good progress since the signing of an agreement in 2000 to increase bilateral cooperation on sanitary and phytosanitary matters.
This is according to Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Minister, Senzeni Zokwana, who recently met with General Administration of Customs of China vice president, Zhang Jiwen, on the sidelines of the recent Forum on Africa-China Cooperation.
He said that since the signing of the agreement, South Africa had been able to gain market access for beef exports in 2017 and for exports of lucerne hay in 2018.
During the meeting, Zokwana announced that South Africa was currently compiling a list of new and compliant beef and lucerne export facilities to be assessed by China before permission was granted for exports. He said this list would have a strong focus on smallholder farms and businesses.
“The objective is to broaden participation of smallholders in accessing markets and ensuring the continued revitalisation of agriculture and the agro-processing value chain,” he added.
Furthermore, Zokwana and Zhang both committed to continue cooperating on market access matters in order to facilitate trade and will meet to discuss animal and plant quarantine and food safety issues at a later meeting in November this year.