The Democratic Republic of the Congo has launched a new strategic group to help Congolese farmers and businesses prepare agricultural products for export to China.
Known as the Task Force Piments, or Pepper Task Force, the initiative was created by the National Agency for the Promotion of Exports, commonly known by its French acronym ANAPEX.
Despite its name, the group will not focus only on chilli peppers. It also targets cocoa, coffee, soy and sesame, products that could give the DRC a broader export base beyond copper, cobalt and other minerals.
According to the Congolese Press Agency, ANAPEX director-general Mike Tambwe announced the task force at the end of a two-day export workshop in Kinshasa on Friday, July 24.
The group is intended to bring public institutions, producers, exporters, technical partners and investors together to solve the problems preventing Congolese products from entering major international markets.
What the Pepper Task Force is expected to do
The task force is intended to help Congolese producers move from having crops with export potential to supplying products that can legally, consistently and competitively enter China.
That requires more than growing pepper, coffee or cocoa.
Exporters must be able to supply the required quantity and quality, prove where the product came from, meet food-safety rules, obtain the necessary certificates, package and label the goods correctly, and deliver them at a price that remains competitive after processing and transport.
Reporting by DeskEco identifies three main objectives:
IMPORT AND EXPORT
DRC Launches Pepper Task Force for China Exports
Jul 25, 2026
Aug 5, 2026
10 min read
Published
Updated:
The Democratic Republic of the Congo has launched a new strategic group to help Congolese farmers and businesses prepare agricultural products for export to China.
Known as the Task Force Piments, or Pepper Task Force, the initiative was created by the National Agency for the Promotion of Exports, commonly known by its French acronym ANAPEX.
Despite its name, the group will not focus only on chilli peppers. It also targets cocoa, coffee, soy and sesame, products that could give the DRC a broader export base beyond copper, cobalt and other minerals.
According to the Congolese Press Agency, ANAPEX director-general Mike Tambwe announced the task force at the end of a two-day export workshop in Kinshasa on Friday, July 24.
The group is intended to bring public institutions, producers, exporters, technical partners and investors together to solve the problems preventing Congolese products from entering major international markets.
What the Pepper Task Force is expected to do
The task force is intended to help Congolese producers move from having crops with export potential to supplying products that can legally, consistently and competitively enter China.
That requires more than growing pepper, coffee or cocoa.
Exporters must be able to supply the required quantity and quality, prove where the product came from, meet food-safety rules, obtain the necessary certificates, package and label the goods correctly, and deliver them at a price that remains competitive after processing and transport.
Reporting by DeskEco identifies three main objectives:
Promote the export of Congolese pepper, cocoa, coffee, soy and sesame;
Help producers use the tariff preferences available in China; and
Assist businesses in meeting Chinese registration, quality and compliance requirements.
ANAPEX says the task force will also serve as a permanent framework through which government departments, the private sector and technical partners can follow the recommendations from the workshop and assess progress.
That coordination will be important. A farmer may produce a high-quality crop but still be unable to export without an organised buyer, an approved processing facility, laboratory results, documents proving origin, reliable transport and sufficient working capital.
China has removed tariffs, but standards still apply
China has opened its market more widely to African goods by granting zero-tariff treatment across all tariff lines to the 53 African countries with which it has diplomatic relations.
For the DRC and other least-developed countries with diplomatic ties to Beijing, China’s treatment covering 100 percent of tariff lines took effect on December 1, 2024.
China extended equivalent coverage to the remaining 20 eligible African economies from May 1, 2026, creating continent-wide access except for Eswatini, which does not have diplomatic relations with Beijing.
ADVERTISEMENT
The tariff policy can make eligible Congolese products more competitive because the importer does not have to pay the normal customs duty. However, zero tariff does not mean automatic entry.
Products must still satisfy Chinese customs, food-safety, plant-health, traceability, registration, packaging and labelling requirements.
China’s revised rules for overseas food producers took effect on June 1, 2026. They require overseas companies producing, processing or storing food for export to China to be registered with the General Administration of Customs of China, or GACC, under the applicable procedure.
Depending on the product and its risk category, a business may apply through the registration system or require review and recommendation from a competent authority in its home country.
Registered producers must continue meeting Chinese food-safety requirements, and qualifying products must carry the appropriate registration information when exported.
For Congolese businesses, that means the task force’s most valuable work may be technical: identifying the correct requirements for each product, helping companies prepare applications, improving testing capacity and preventing exporters from spending money on shipments that will be rejected at the border.
The main recommendations from the Kinshasa workshop
Participants at the two-day meeting proposed several measures intended to make Congolese exporters more competitive.
1. Create dedicated export financing
Farmers, cooperatives and small businesses may need money long before a buyer pays for the final shipment.
They must purchase crops, operate processing equipment, pay for testing, buy packaging, transport goods and complete export documentation.
The workshop therefore recommended a financing mechanism dedicated to exporters, particularly those investing in processing, packaging and certification.
No bank, public fund, interest rate, eligibility rule or amount was announced. Until such a mechanism is funded and accessible, financing will remain a recommendation rather than an available service.
2. Invest in processing and packaging
Selling cleaned, dried, graded, roasted, ground or packaged products can create more value than exporting untreated crops.
ADVERTISEMENT
A pepper producer, for example, may earn more from a consistent, safely dried and properly packaged product than from loose peppers sold without grading or traceability.
The same principle applies to roasted or packaged coffee, processed cocoa products and cleaned sesame.
Local processing can also create jobs in sorting, quality control, machinery maintenance, packaging, design, warehousing and logistics.
3. Strengthen certification and laboratories
Exporters need credible evidence that their goods satisfy the buyer’s specifications and the destination country’s health and safety requirements.
That may include testing for pesticide residues, contaminants, moisture, microbiological risks or other product-specific standards.
Participants called for stronger national quality-control laboratories so that more testing and certification can be completed reliably inside the DRC.
Without sufficient laboratory capacity, businesses may face delays, additional costs or the need to send samples abroad.
4. Train producers and first-time exporters
ANAPEX wants more practical training for small and medium-sized enterprises, cooperatives and businesses attempting to export for the first time.
The proposed training covers origin procedures, market-research platforms, Chinese registration systems, digital trade tools and geolocation.
Geolocation and farm-level records can help exporters trace a shipment back to the production area. This becomes increasingly important when buyers need proof of origin, production practices or supply-chain control.
5. Attract technology and investment
Workshop participants also called for public-private partnerships and foreign investment to modernise processing units, transfer technology and develop agricultural value chains.
Investment could help producers overcome a common problem: having a marketable crop without the machinery or infrastructure needed to supply it in the form, volume and quality demanded by international buyers.
ADVERTISEMENT
TRENDING NOW
POPULAR TODAY
However, future partnerships will need clear rules so that farmers receive fair prices and Congolese businesses participate meaningfully in processing and distribution.
GACC and REX are not the same system
The workshop discussed both GACC and REX, but exporters should understand that they serve different markets and purposes.
GACC is China’s customs authority. Its registration and import-control systems are directly relevant to food businesses that want to sell into China.
REX, the Registered Exporter system, is a European Union system that allows registered businesses to make statements on the origin of goods under applicable preferential trade arrangements.
REX can therefore help qualifying Congolese exporters prove origin when using certain European trade preferences, but it is not the registration system for entering China.
The broader message from ANAPEX is that Congolese businesses need the correct market-access tools for each destination rather than treating every export market as if it follows the same rules.
Why agricultural exports so important for the DRC
China is already the DRC’s largest export destination, but the relationship is dominated by minerals.
World Trade Organization data show that China received 57.6 percent of Congolese exports in 2023. Refined copper cathodes, cobalt products and copper ores accounted for the overwhelming majority of the DRC’s exports worldwide.
Cocoa beans represented only 0.5 percent of total exports in the same dataset.
This concentration makes the new task force economically significant. The DRC is not trying to find a completely new trading partner; it is trying to sell a more diverse group of products to a country that already buys large volumes of Congolese goods.
Expanding agricultural exports could:
create income for farmers and cooperatives;
generate rural and processing jobs;
increase demand for transport, storage and packaging;
help small businesses enter international supply chains;
earn foreign currency outside the mining sector; and
reduce the economy’s dependence on a narrow group of mineral exports.
The benefits will be greater if products are processed inside the DRC before export.
Shipping raw crops can create farm income, but local transformation allows more of the product’s final value to remain in the country.
ADVERTISEMENT
RELATED ARTICLE
