Non-Tariff Barriers

Complaint

Complaint number

NTB-000-776  

NTB Type

8.7. Costly Road user charges /fees  

Complaint

Tanzania still charges US$500 to Uganda trucks compared to US$152 charged on Rwanda trucks.  

Status note

On 14 June 2022, EAC Secretariat reported that the experts' meeting met in March 2022 and gave recommendations to be considered by TCM.The Sectoral Committee on Trade was informed that the two Partner States had a bilateral meeting and agreed to charge Uganda tracks 10 USD charged per 100 Kilometers. Hence the NTB is resolved  

Progress update note

1. During the Extra Ordinary SCTIFI, the issues of Road User Charges were referred to the Sectoral Council on TCM for resolution.
2. The meeting Senior Officials meeting that met in October 2017 noted that this NTB would be resolved if Road User Charges were harmonised with in the EAC. The meeting therefore urged the Secretariat to expedite the process of harmonisation of the Road User Charges to facilitate resolving this NTB.
3.The Ministerial bilateral meeting held on 19 December 2018 directed that Experts and Senior officials of the two countries should engage and harmonize the charges and report progress to the Ministers by end of June 2019.
4. During the SCTIFI meeting of 16th November 2018, Tanzania reported that she is committed to resolve this by December 2018 as agreed during the Bilateral meeting.
5. The 27th Regional Monitoring Committee meeting held from 29 April - 3 May 2019 noted that Tanzania was committed to resolve this NTB as agreed during the Bilateral meeting. Uganda requested that this NTB be discussed during the PSs level bilateral meeting.
6. The Ministerial bilateral meeting held on 19 December 2018 directed that Experts and Senior officials of the two countries should engage and harmonize the charges and report progress to the Ministers by end of June 2019.
The Extra Ordinary SCTIFI of September, 2019 noted that the matter will be resolved by the concerned Partner States as agreed by November 2019.
7. During the NMC meeting of 13th - 14th March 2020 Tanzania reported that the bilateral discussions between the two Partner States are yet to be concluded.
8.During the RMC, the united Republic of Tanzania proposed to have another bilateral meeting to resolve the NTB.
Uganda informed the meeting that they are going to apply similar charges to what Tanzania is charging Uganda trucks entering Tanzania. This is because the 3 Bilateral meetings already occurred 1 at technical level and 2 meetings at the level of the Summit and Uganda do not need any other Bilateral.The RMC meeting noted that the treatment of charging different rates to Partner States in the same Common Market is against Article 18 of the EAC Common Market Protocol on Most Favoured Nation (MFN) Treatment.
9.The SCTIFI recommended that the NTB be referred to the Sectoral Committee on Transport with two options as follow:
1. All EAC Partner States to charge road user fees per Kilometer and per Axle; or
2. Adopt a flat rate to be applied by all EAC Partner States.
In the Interim, the meeting requested that the United Republic of Tanzania extends similar treatment to all EAC Partner States as that provided to Rwanda and Burundi.
10.The 17th meeting of the Sectoral Council on Transport, Communications, and Meteorology held in June 2021 directed:
(a) The Secretariat to convene and coordinate a bilateral meeting between the Republic of Uganda and the United Republic of Tanzania to resolve the Road User Charges (RUCs) issues between the two Partner States;
b) The Secretariat to convene a regional meeting of experts by September 2021 to discuss the issue of RUCs in the region and the report of the experts be tabled at the 18th TCM or at an extraordinary meeting of the TCM. The Secretariat will convene the Regional Experts Meeting on Road User Charges in November 2021 and Report back to the 18th TCM.  

Policy or regulatory NTB

Yes 

Location

Tanzania: Ministry of Works, Transport & Communications (Government institution)  

Reporting Country or Region

Uganda  

Country specific trade issue

No  

Date of incident

2017-05-05  

Status

Resolved  

Date of resolution

2022-06-14  

Product Description

Computer-assisted translation

• English
• Arabic
• French
• Portuguese

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Total value

0  

Date reported

2017-08-03 09:17  

Modified

2022-06-14 17:34