East African Business Week

KAMPALA, UGANDA -- Ugandan traders working in South Sudan have resumed normal business, having left in the run-up to the referendum made South Sudan an independent state in January.
Mr. Issa Sekito, the spokesperson of Kampala City Traders Association (KACITA), said the situation in the newly formed country had stabilized and that the traders were already going about with their work.
"Besides the usual problems of hijackings, roadblocks, the hostile business environment and the numerous fights the traders have with the locals, the business environment in Sudan is continuously attracting the Ugandan traders to the region."
Sekito told East African Business Week in an interview.
At Arua pack, buses and trucks are loaded daily with different merchandise destined to leave Kampala for Southern Sudan.
These virtually include everything from household and food items. On the other hand Uganda's imports from Sudan mainly include raw materials and textiles.
Mr. David Okot, a business man and a driver of Nile coaches at the pack, says limited passengers were using their transport services during the insurgency in southern Sudan but now that the situation is back to normal, many traders are hiring them once again.
"Business here is thriving as the majority of business men not only want us to render our services to them but to also help them in monitoring the market situation in the region," Okot said.
Okot however adds much as the situation there is back to normal, the newly introduced tariffs levied on produce at the different boarder points of south Sudan is making them dig deeper into their pockets.
Traders in the past have been noted to pay over 40% per 100kg bag in these new taxes to the southern Sudan Government for commodities like beans, simsim, flour, cassava and potatoes.