Two Samoas agree to chip away at trade barriers

Transcript

Two days of talks between the two Samoas have ended on a positive note, with both sides agreeing to come up with solutions to ease trade barriers.

A government and business delegation from Samoa travelled to American Samoa last week for annual economic cooperation talks.

Our correspodent in Pago Pago, Monica Miller, says the talks appear to have gained more than most, with a pledge being made to work on a trade and economic agreement to be signed at the next meeting.

But, as she tells Jamie Tahana, significant hurdles remain for businesses.

MONICA MILLER: The meeting that took place this week is the joint taskforce and this is the group that's made up of different directors and CEOs of ministries. One of the things that they've been working on is to come to an economic integration agreement particularly looking at trade, areas that businesses can work on together, and also labour mobility; how the expertise, professionals and even trades between the two Samoas can move around. The agreement, and a lot of the topics that are discussed, also deal with some of the regulations, particularly in American Samoa, that would hamper business or trading. They're going to go through and come up with a document and this will be finalised and then presented to the leaders of the two Samoas.

JAMIE TAHANA: What is the situation like now with trade between the two Samoas?

MM: OK, well the biggest export from Samoa right now would be Vailima beer [laughs], there's also taro exports. There's been a push to have businesses from the two sides set up in each others' jurisdictions; McDonalds American Samoa, two years ago, was able to expand to Samoa and also some smaller businesses, mainly in construction as well as consultancy engineering type services from the territory have been able to set up in Samoa. But it's only been recently in the past couple of years that companies from Samoa have been able to set up in the territory, but the businesses from Samoa that have come here, they've found that the licencing laws as well as getting permits for land use and that sort of thing can be quite strenuous here.

JT: What other opportunities or proposals have been made to make it easier?

MM: In terms of immigration, for example, the businesspeople in Samoa say that they want to be able to just get on the plane and come and get a permit here, but right now they have to apply from Samoa and then it goes through a review and it might take a couple of days, so they're trying to get a special permit for business people only. Now, one of the things that Samoa has tried to do for a long time is to be able to export meat products -- sausages and corned beef, people here love that stuff -- but because the federal government prohibits the importation of any meat products that are from a facility that hasn't been USFDA approved. Other things that they've talked about is perhaps bringing down duty for certain items; like, American Samoa has tried to export canned tuna to Apia, but they say that the duty is so high.

JT: I guess too, you mentioned with the corned beef and stuff. American Samoa is a US territory and, of course, US trade laws apply, and as we've seen with fishing and stuff sometime they're not quite aligned with what American Samoa wants. Is that a challenge?

MM:  The delegation from Samoa has said that the federal regulations have always been a hurdle, and they have been hoping that the local government would try and get an exemption for trading with Samoa because of the closeness and because of the cultural links, it still seems that the stumbling block is on this side because the territory has to abide by US regulations.