Briefing from ROAPE Volume 30 Number 96
AGOA, Lesotho's 'Clothing Miracle' & Politics of Sweatshops

The 'Africa Growth and Opportunity Act' (AGOA) was signed into US law at the end of August 2000. Perhaps the most important provision of this version of the Act (AGOA I) was that it conferred duty-free status to clothing articles directly imported into the US from beneficiary countries, until 30 September 2008. To command beneficiary status, countries had to meet a series of political and economic conditions, with the result that 38 countries are currently included in benefits. In addition, beneficiary countries have to have an export visa system approved by the US Customs Department. As of early March 2003, nineteen had done so. The only important clothing manufacturing country in Africa that remains excluded from AGOA benefits is Zimbabwe