Cosatu Parliamentary Coordinator, Matthew Parks says it’s of paramount importance to make AGOA more effective to benefit both business and the country’s labour sector.
SA hosted the African Growth and Opportunity Act’s Forum in Johannesburg, which ended on Saturday.
The government hopes the forum will create a significant opportunity to elevate issues associated with labour standards and social justice.
Parks says as long as the US-Africa trade pact is lucrative and able to address unemployment challenges faced in the country, Cosatu is in favour of it.
“We are in support of it as it creates thousands of jobs in SA for example, the motor manufacturing industry, clothing and textiles, agriculture, chemical and many other critical expert sectors to the US. We have an unemployment rate of 42% and youth unemployment is at 60% and our fundamental mandate is to defend all possible jobs and see how we could reduce unemployment. We think we should not settle for an extension but see how we could enhance it. As SA, we want to see how could better utilise it to drive our industrial development.”
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