African countries need to integrate their digital strategies in order to make goals of the Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) achievable and bring benefits to millions of people on the continent. This is part of the submissions of Managing Partner at Chanzo Capital, Eric Osiakwan while speaking at the recent special edition of the MTN Business Executive Breakfast Series on the theme “Accelerating SME Growth and Development – the role of Digitization”. Watch event here. Because digitization is going to play a key role in actualizing AfCFTA, governments of member countries must commit to a workable and sustainable digitization process by providing the support infrastructure and policies to help foster digital innovation notably within the private sector. Ghana has already taken the lead in providing infrastructure and the policies to drive digitization, said Osiakwan pointing to the ghana.gov platform, GHQR and the soon to be introduced e-cedi by the Bank of Ghana. But AfCFTA’s success across countries will hinge on a continent-wide approach to integrating policy-efforts and infrastructure developments of all its members. Benefits from AfCFTA cannot be achieved in silos, said Osiakwan who has extensive experience in policies and investments on the continent. “The only way to make AfCFTA work is for us to have an Africa-wide digital strategy that bring everyone along and that means we need to quickly start integrating the digital strategies for the benefit of the entire continent,” he said. Touching on the pace at which African countries are adopting blockchain technology, he argued that there is need...

Achieving African integration is not an end in itself. The purpose must be to offer the African citizenry prosperity and security. The objective of both regional and continental integration must enable African countries benefit from economies of scale, trade amongst themselves, move freely across the continent and most importantly, benefit from the common goals of Africa’s Agenda 2063, aimed at shared prosperity, unity and integration. The commemorative activities of the African Integration Day that kicked off on the 7th of July, will examine into details, the status of the continental integration and with particular focus on the role of continental integration in accelerating African economic recovery from the COVID-19 Pandemic. In the last two decades, Africa has recorded a 4.6 percent growth rate on average, despite an unfavourable international economic and financial environment. The current COVID-19 pandemic has however plunged the continent into its first recession in 25 years exposing the vulnerability of African economies. The cumulative loss of Africa's GDP is estimated at between $145 and $190 billion with worrying projections that 39 million more people could be pushed into extreme poverty, if urgent and purposed measures are not taken to address the socio-economic difficulties caused by the pandemic. Accelerating African economic recovery has brought to the fore, yet again, the need to piece the puzzle of African integration. With a fragile recovery based on the health, economic and financial measures member states were quick to implement at the onset to curb the spread of COVID-19 and mitigate the...

Ghana’s exports to the UK remain largely primary products The Business Climate Report has urged the country to change its old practice of exporting primary products to the United Kingdom (UK), which has persistently resulted in a negative trade balance at the country’s expense. The 2020 report indicated that the UK imported US$242million worth of goods, while Ghana on the other hand imported US$473million worth of goods from the UK – presenting a negative trade balance of about US$231million. This, the report said, is attributed to factors such as the country’s continuous export of raw materials and import of manufactured goods, coupled with a drop in the level of exports against imports in trade with the UK – a trend that may continue for a long time if nothing concrete is done to change the narrative. “The goods traded between the two countries have not changed substantially over the period. Ghana’s exports to the UK remain largely primary products, while imports from the UK have mainly been manufactured goods. This accounts for the negative trade balance to the disadvantage of Ghana. Our forecasts show that this trend is likely to continue into the near future,” the report stated. Top-five exports from Ghana to UK, which are mostly in their raw state, remain as follows: mineral fuels, oils, and distillation products; meat, fish and seafood preparations; cocoa and cocoa preparations; edible fruit, nuts, peel of citrus fruit, melons; and edible vegetables and certain roots and tubers. On the other hand, top-five...

Fintech companies in Africa are flourishing by producing digital systems and infrastructure to make financial services more efficient. And with the launch of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) at the start of this year, the companies are well positioned to replicate this success by providing solutions for what is the largest free trade area globally by the number of countries taking part in it. Solving cross-border payment within the continent could “exponentially increase intra-Africa trade,” according to the United Nations Development Programme and the AfCFTA secretariat. In a case study cited in one of their recent reports, Godwin Benson, the CEO of Tuteria, a Nigerian peer-to-peer learning platform, says: “It should be easy for customers in Egypt or Rwanda to pay a business in Nigeria. Recently, a customer from Cameroon wanted to pay us but could not carry out the transaction. Without seamless intra-African payments, businesses like Tuteria, especially those run by young entrepreneurs, may not be able to trade across the continent.” AfCFTA aims to increase intra-African trade by the creation of a single market There’s relatively low trade amongst African countries, compared to other parts of the world. For instance, intra-African trade (the average of intra-African exports and imports), was around 2% in 2015-2017, compared to 61% for Asia and 67% for Europe. AfCFTA aims to create a single market for goods and services in Africa by progressively eliminating tariffs and non-tariff barriers to trade. It was brought about by the African Continental Free Trade Agreement , which has been signed by 54 of the...

TradeMark Africa (TMA) and the Agence Française de Développement (AFD), signed this afternoon a €29.9 million (approx. USD 35.5 million) grant agreement to contribute to more sustainable and inclusive regional economic integration in the Horn of Africa. The funding comes from the European Union, who delegated it to AFD via a €32 million total financing agreement, signed one week earlier between the two parties. The TMA-AFD project will focus on the Djibouti corridor as the main artery of trade for Ethiopia, whilst also supporting more inclusive trade between Djibouti and Ethiopia. The overall objective is to enhance the competitiveness of this corridor through logistical and regulatory improvements (reduction of transport and transit times at ports and border crossings, simplification of procedures and reduction of associated costs) and strengthening the capacity of stakeholders to benefit from these improvements, including the most vulnerable. It will be implemented according to four lines of operation: Reduction of trade costs and time along the Djibouti-Ethiopia corridor, from Djibouti Port to the Galafi border post and the dry ports in Simplification and harmonisation of procedures, standards and regulations governing trade between the two countries, bringing them into line with the various trade agreements signed, with a view to their Support to enterprises and producers in the logistics sector both in Ethiopia and in Djibouti and in the export Support to the most vulnerable populations: small traders at the borders, women operating in export sectors, , to enable them to take advantage of these improvements. In 2019,...

The number of countries that ratified the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) agreement has increased to 40 with the recent ratification of Zambia, Malawi, Algeria and Burundi, a top official told reporters on Friday, July 9. Secretary-General Wamkele Mene was addressing his second quarterly press briefing. He noted that the DR Congo, Seychelles and Burundi ratified but are yet to deposit their instruments of ratification, quickly adding: "But it's a very positive signal, the fact that 40 countries have ratified." "This is a very important development," Mene noted, adding that he recently visited Tanzania and had fruitful discussions with its leaders. End last month, the Secretary-General visited the country and met with President Samia Suluhu Hassan. "Its President told me that Tanzania will ratify by September and that means that one of the biggest economies in Africa is also going to ratify," he said. "With Tanzania (ratifying) it means that EAC, the entire Customs Union, will now be part of the implementation of the AfCFTA." Burundi ratified the AfCFTA on June 17, becoming the fourth East African Community (EAC) country to ratify following in the footsteps of Rwanda, the most committed country to the Agreement, Kenya and Uganda. The agreement initialed in Kigali, on March 21, 2018, aims to create the largest free-trade area in the world and the EAC business community wants things fast-tracked. The Continental Free Trade Area aims to reduce all trade costs - eliminate 90% of tariffs - and enable Africa to integrate further into...

Burundian President Evariste Ndayishimiye has made a three-day State visit to the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) to strengthen relations between the two neighbours. Mr Ndayishimiye was received at the Ndijili Airport in Kinshasa on Monday by Prime Minister Jean-Michel Sama Lukonde. He met with President Felix Tshisekedi on Tuesday for bilateral talks on security and economic ties. The two leaders are expected to sign agreements on a railway infrastructure project between Burundi’s capital Gitenga and Kindu city in east-central DRC, a line that will also facilitate the transit of products to Uvinza in Tanzania. The project was part of talks between President Tshisekedi and his host the late president Pierre Nkurunziza when the former visited Burundi during a charm offensive in the East African Community member states soon after he assumed office in January 2019. Nkurunziza died in June 2020. The visit comes nearly two weeks after the Congolese leader met with Burundian Foreign Affairs minister Albert Shingiro in DRC’s eastern border city of Goma in North Kivu. On security, the leaders are expected to address rebel activity in eastern DRC as well as issues of refugees with both countries hosting Burundian and Congolese nationals on either side. Read original article

The IOTA NFT Marketplace aims to solve the existing challenges of other NFT platforms like a high-fee structure. Access to the test version of the IOTA NFT marketplace is now available as users can create free accounts on the platform. IOTA, the open-source distributed ledger and IoT-specific blockchain platform, is now diving into the world of NFTs. On Monday, July 12, the IOTA community announced the launch of the IOTA NFT marketplace. The launch happened on the IOTA 2.0 DevNet illustrating the future of digital assets and NFTs that are accessible to all. IOTA notes that its feeless protocol helps it to deliver the right NFT infrastructure while solving some of the existing limitations of the NFT market. Non-fungible tokens have created a massive rage in the crypto space over the last six months. Besides, the market has witnessed NFT sales worth Millions-of-dollars in a short time. As the name suggests, non-fungible tokens help in the unique representation of assets. This could be anything like a piece of artwork, videos, images, etc. Thus, NFTs are basically cryptographic tokens representing something unique in a digitized form. In today’s world, anything can be digitized and represented as an NFT. While NFTs have seen major market acceptance because of their value proposition, IOTA thinks that there are still many drawbacks. With the existing setup of the NFT market, getting the NFTs to the buyer is very expensive. It involves high-end costs like the minting fee for creating the NFT, platform listing costs additional, then comes...

Most African governments seem lost to find the solution to Covid-induced economic problems. Africa recorded its first Covid case in Egypt on February 14 2020. Since then, all the countries have reported cases with some economic distress plunging in. Initially confined to capital cities, cases are now reported in a significant number of countries, multiple provinces and regions. By May 4 2020, the number of confirmed Covid cases had risen to 44, 873 and caused 1, 807 deaths. The African countries with the highest number of infections are South Africa, Egypt, Morocco and Algeria. However, the full scope of the pandemic remains uncertain, as cases are underreported and the accuracy of data collection varies considerably. On April 17 2020, the World Health Organisation (WHO) warned that Africa could be the next epicentre of the coronavirus. Although the number of Covid cases and fatalities might still appear comparatively low in Africa than in other regions, the looming health shock of Covid could have disastrous impacts on the continent already strained health systems, and could quickly turn into a social and economic emergency. Beyond health risks, the Covid shock to African economies is coming in three waves: Lower trade and investment from China in the immediate term; a demand slump associated with the lockdowns in the European Union and a continental supply shock affecting domestic and intra-African trade. It is shaking commodity-driven growth models that had largely failed to create more and better jobs or improve well-being. On the health front, greater...

In a bid to drive U.S. investment in the African energy sector, the U.S.-Africa Energy Forum (USAEF) 2021 kicked off on Monday with a virtual session – organized by Energy Capital & Power – featuring petroleum ministers from Republic of the Congo and Equatorial Guinea along with leading energy and finance industry leaders. Under the theme, The U.S.-Africa Energy Partnership: Successes and New Horizons, the first of two virtual sessions identified key factors behind investment success stories on the continent, as well as leading opportunities for future cooperation, centering on the clean energy value chain and full implementation of the African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA). Opening remarks were given by H.E. Bruno Jean Richard Itoua, Minister of Hydrocarbons of Republic of the Congo – a veteran of the oil and gas industry and one of the founding members of the National Petroleum Company of Congo – and NJ Ayuk, Executive Chairman of the African Energy Chamber (AEC). “Cooperation between America and Africa will be a key factor for the global future,” said H.E. Minister Itoua. “In energy, Africa is not the problem. Africa is the solution. This becomes even more true when you talk about the transition. We have substantial quantities of oil, but more importantly, we have substantial quantities of gas – which is the first part of the energy transition – as well as one of the most important potentials for renewables.” “We can no longer accept that more than 650 million on the African continent go without electricity every day,...