It’s hard to quarrel with the idea that reduced trade barriers around American markets would be a boon for African exporters. The quintessential example is Lesotho, whose textile industry has flourished since joining AGOA and now exports more than $400 million worth of garment manufactures to the United States annually.

But there’s a catch. The U.S. president reserves the right to reevaluate each country for AGOA eligibility on an annual basis; 41 made the cut last year. In order to qualify, African countries have to meet a specific set of stringent “conditions.” Topping the list is the requirement that the beneficiary promote “a market-based economy that protects private property rights… and minimizes government interference in the economy through such measures as price controls, subsidies, and government ownership of economic assets.” In addition – and here’s the big one – the beneficiary must make progress toward “the elimination of barriers to United States trade and investment.”

In other words, AGOA eligibility requires not just mild economic deregulation but the outright destruction of any and all tariff protections, flinging open African markets to a flood of American goods that inevitably undermine local industry. And African countries don’t really have a choice in the matter, for if they refuse to meet these conditions, they effectively forfeit their access to the American market. For all of the positive spin that U.S. policymakers put on AGOA, nobody ever so much as mentions these draconian measures, which are easily as destructive as the dreaded “structural adjustment” conditions that the International Monetary Fund attaches to its loans. Essentially, AGOA amounts to a coercive free trade agreement with most of the subcontinent.

Given that AGOA requires its beneficiaries to eliminate barriers to U.S. investment, it’s not surprising that the balance of trade comes out strongly in favor of the United States. Trade data shows that Benin, for example, has exported almost nothing to the United States since it became an AGOA member, but has imported some $600 million worth of U.S. goods that have significantly undercut local producers. Some countries do actually export a great deal under AGOA rules – but only those with substantial petroleum and mineral deposits. Take Angola, for instance; 99 percent of all of Angola’s exports under AGOA have been energy-related. In the Congo, that number reaches closer to 100 percent. The same is true of Nigeria, Botswana, and every other country with an oil and mineral portfolio. Indeed, more than 80 percent of all exports under AGOA fall under this sector.

AGOA, in other words, is designed to pry open new markets for U.S. goods while making it easier for the United States to extract oil and minerals. And since most of Africa’s oil and minerals are controlled by Western corporations like Exxon, Shell, and Anglo-American, this is hardly an arrangement designed to benefit African businesses.