Since 1994, trade and investment ties between the US and South Africa have evolved against the backdrop of a complicated political and diplomatic setting.
Despite vociferous lobbying by chicken farmers against South Africa's inclusion in a renewed Agoa agreement, the US senate approved a bill extending Agoa for 10 years, with South Africa included.
Excluding South Africa from the new Agoa dispensation could have harmed the country's trade.
If the review found that the South African market was not sufficiently open to US products, the US could limit South Africa's Agoa benefits or suspend its participation in the scheme.
It is for this reason that when South Africa, in the early 1990s, applied to the World Trade Organisation for reclassification as a developing nation the US, supported by the European Union and Japan, objected.
