Globalization existed since era of slave trade

by Staff Reporter

East African states should integrate fully in order to enhance economies of scale and create larger markets in order to reap increased benefits from international trade.

Addressing over 300 members of the East Africa Law Society (EALS) annual conference and annual general meeting in Entebbe, Uganda last week, Ugandan President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni said globalization should force African nations into regional integration so that they can have larger blocs with bargaining power.

He noted that globalization had existed in Africa for over 500 years ever since the era of slave trade. However, he lamented, that the globalization that Africa had experienced had been parasitic. "There is need for a mutually beneficial form of globalization", he said. The two-day conference whose theme was Globalization and Terrorism: New Threats to Regional Integration, discussed various issues relating to globalization, the World Trade Organization (WTO), the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATs), and the current trends and dynamics in international trade.

EALS’s president, Professor Frederick Sempebwa said that EALS had a key role to play in hastening, widening and deepening East African Regional integration.

The lawyers resolved among others that EALS should take the challenge of building the capacity of East African lawyers in international trade law. 

Last modified: October 23, 2003.
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