Abstract
The authors present and assess the EAC Common Market Scorecard (CMS) which was published in 2014 for the first time by the World Bank Group in collaboration with the EAC Secretariat. The EAC-CMS is part of the implementation process of the EAC Common Market Protocol, which came into force in 2010, and seeks to monitor how EAC member states have been undertaking measures to review their domestic regulatory environments to ensure compliance with the Protocol and bring the resulting business environment towards a common (and upgraded) regional standard. The authors present a preliminary assessment of the scorecard. They look at its purpose and scope, methodological framework (including data collection and validation), governance and stakeholder structure, communication and reporting aspects, and perspectives for the future.
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Notes
- 1.
More precisely, the EAC was revived after it had already existed between 1967 and 1977. The treaty was signed in 1999 and entered into force in 2000.
- 2.
On the implementation challenges for the regional harmonization of commercial laws, see also Agaba (2011).
- 3.
An EAC Metrology Bill was mooted in 2009.
- 4.
The endorsement of the Action Plan for the Single Market by the European Council of Amsterdam of 17 June 1997 led to the creation of the ‘Single Market Scoreboard’, first published in November 1997. The European Council emphasized “the crucial importance of timely and correct transposition of all agreed legislation into national law; the need to fully inform citizens and business about the Single Market and the need for active enforcement of Single Market rules in the Member States” (European Commission, 1997: 1). DG Internal Market and Services developed quantitative and qualitative methodologies to assess (i) the transposition of Internal Market directives into national law, and (ii) the number of infringement proceedings initiated by the Commission against the member States. The Internal Market Scoreboard (IMS) is published twice a year since then. See: http://ec.europa.eu/internal_market/score/index_en.htm. Interestingly, the methodology of the IMS has also been adapted to be used by the EFTA member states that signed the EEA Agreement. With the ‘Internal Market Scoreboard – EFTA States’ (IMS-EFTA) the EFTA Surveillance Authority aims at measuring the effectiveness of the Internal Market rules that are part of the EEA Agreement and encouraging the transposition of the Internal Market directives in a timely manner. In addition, the IMS-EFTA contains information on the infringement proceedings commenced by the EFTA Surveillance Authority against the EFTA States with the objective to ensure correct enforcement of the rules. The IMS-EFTA, together with the Interim Report on Transposition Status of Directives, has been published since May 1998 and is published twice a year (Costea et al., 2008). For further details and updated information, see Chap. 1 in this book.
- 5.
ASEAN adopted the ASEAN Economic Community Blueprint in Nov. 2007, outlining the measures to be taken (and the time frame for implementation) in order to establish a competitive single market by 2015. The first Scorecard was published in March 2010 and covered the period 2008–2009. See: http://www.asean.org/publications/AEC%20Scorecard.pdf. It should be observed, however, that the scope of the AEC Scorecard goes beyond the ‘single market’; it also covers other dimensions: ‘competitive economic region’, ‘equitable economic development’, and ‘integration into the global economy’. See also, Chap. 13 in this book.
- 6.
Ideally, EAC Partner States should notify the EAC Secretariat and other EAC Partner States about potential measures that are under consideration and that are likely to affect the enjoyment of rights under the protocol by other Partner States. However, currently there exists no infrastructure or clear policy for a system of notifications. The scorecard partially addressed this problem, by outlining key measures that the Partner States had taken that were inconsistent to their obligations to the EAC Common Market Protocol. However, this only provided information as regards existing measures, but not (perhaps the more important) ex-ante measures i.e. legal, regulatory, administrative and policy proposals that have not yet been promulgated. The latter are more useful, given that they are designed to allow other EAC Partner States to exercise their right of advance comment on potential common market-limiting measures.
- 7.
UNECA has relevant expertise in monitoring category III variables, built-up in the framework of its ARIA Reports and indicator system (UNECA 2002, 2003, 2004). See, Chap. 9 in this book. Also of relevance is the recent ACP Monitoring Regional Integration project, involving the design of an indicator system for monitoring the regional integration processes in the various ACP subregions. See: http://mri.acp.int/spip.php?page=indexen. See, Chap. 10 in this book.
- 8.
See e.g. De Lombaerde and Van Langenhove (2010: 2–29).
- 9.
The World Bank Group conducts a number of business questionnaires on business climate issues. Enterprise Surveys (www.enterprisesurveys.org) are firm-level surveys of a representative sample of an economy’s private sector. The surveys cover a broad range of business environment topics including access to finance, corruption, infrastructure, crime, competition, and performance measures. Doing Business Reports (www.doingbusiness.org) provide measures of business regulations for local firms in (currently) 183 economies and selected cities. The Investing Across Borders Report (www.iab.worldbank.org) is a World Bank Group initiative comparing regulation of foreign direct investment around the world. It presents quantitative indicators on economies’ laws, regulations, and practices affecting how foreign companies invest across sectors, start businesses, access industrial land, and arbitrate commercial disputes. According to the 2016 edition of the Ease of Doing Business Report, performance across the EAC economies varies: Rwanda is ranked 62nd globally, followed by Tanzania (131st), Kenya (136th), Uganda (150th), and Burundi (152nd), on a total of 183 economies covered by the Report.
- 10.
An on-line reporting tool has been designed with support from TradeMark and GIZ.
- 11.
In the case of the ASEAN Economic Community, benchmarks are found in the AEC Blueprint and in the AEC Strategic Schedule (Rillo 2011).
- 12.
- 13.
The EAC has a harmonized passport. In an effort to encourage ease of movement, Kenya and Rwanda made it acceptable to cross their mutual borders with only an identification card, and in 2010 the two countries entered into a reciprocal agreement waiving the work permit fee.
- 14.
Where checklists were shared with entrepreneurs and business people, the input sought was not their perceptions, but they were rather contacted as a source of information, specifically as regards administrative letters from public authorities requesting their compliance with various industry regulations.
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Ombudo K’Ombudo, A., De Lombaerde, P., Borda, M. (2017). The East African Community Common Market Scorecard. In: De Lombaerde, P., Saucedo Acosta, E. (eds) Indicator-Based Monitoring of Regional Economic Integration. United Nations University Series on Regionalism, vol 13. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-50860-3_11
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