More than 40 countries signed the protocol to the treaty establishing the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) in Kigali. The AfCFTA faces hurdles, but the eminent African tasked with reforming the African Union, Donald Kaberuka, remains optimistic. He spoke to Berna Namata. Before the AfCFTA, there were advanced talks on a tripartite area to bring together the EAC, SADC and Comesa, which could have covered about half of Africa. This trade deal is an acceleration of that process. Second, what we have learnt in this region is that it is possible to increase trade once you bring down tariffs as we have done in East Africa, because the level of trade within the region has almost reached the Association of Southeast Asian Nations levels -- just under 30 per cent. This is very significant. We now know that tariffs were not the most difficult thing to overcome: It is non-tariff restrictions. I hope and expect that as we launch the AfCFTA, we will bring these lessons to bare. There are gains to opening up, but we need to work hard on logistics, non-tariff restrictions and freedom of movement of people. There are several issues that need to be settled to make the AfCFTA agreement effective, but they require stronger political commitment. How much of a concern is this? I wouldn't say political will as such; it is how you address the fears of those who think that when you come together, it is a zero-sum game. There will of...

KIGALI, Mar. 22 (Xinhua) -- Africa expects to have a win-win situation with its partners through the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), Chairman of the African Union (AU) and Rwandan President Paul Kagame said on Wednesday. The AfCFTA will broaden the existing partnership between Africa and its partners, said Kagame at a press conference after the 10th Extraordinary Session of the Assembly of the AU on the AfCFTA. With the continental free trade area, both Africa and its partners will have a much bigger market and benefit all, said the president. "Until now, the African external partners, China and others, have good relations with Africa," said President of Niger Mahamadou Issoufou. African and the external partners will be able to work together on the AfCTFA, said Issoufou, adding that Africa will be in a position to share the growth brought by the AfCFTA with external partners, in particular with China. Forty-four African countries on Wednesday signed an agreement to establish the AfCFTA during the one-day extraordinary session. The agreement will be submitted for ratification by state parties in accordance with their domestic laws. The decision to form the AfCFTA was adopted in January 2012 during the 18th Ordinary Session of the Assembly of Heads of State and Government of the AU while AfCFTA negotiations were launched by the AU in 2015. The AfCFTA is aimed at creating a single continental market for goods and services with free movement of businesses and investments. This, according to the AU, will pave...

“LET’S get together,” sang the choir to the rhythm of Bob Marley, as a succession of African leaders signed an ambitious, continent-wide free-trade agreement in Kigali on March 21st. Although all 55 members of the African Union (AU) had been involved in negotiations around the grandly named Continental Free Trade Area (CFTA), not all were ready to sign as one. On the day, 44 put pen to paper. Among the holdouts was Nigeria, Africa’s largest economy. Paul Kagame, Rwanda’s president and the host of the AU summit, had no time for sceptics. “Some horses decided to drink the water. Others have excuses and they end up dying of thirst.” The logic of the deal is sound. Trade in Africa is still shaped by relationships and infrastructure dating back to the colonial era. Countries mostly sell primary commodities to other continents. Only 18% of their exports are traded within Africa, where they often face high tariffs. The CFTA is meant to change that by creating a “single continental market for goods and services”. UNCTAD, a UN agency, reckons that eliminating import taxes between African countries would increase regional trade by a third and lift African GDP by 1% over time. Currently, nearly half of this trade is in manufactured goods. Services would also be opened up. But not everyone is convinced. Muhammadu Buhari, Nigeria’s president, cancelled his flight to Kigali amid domestic pressure. An official says Nigeria was given just a few days to read the text, which he worries will...

The Kigali Convention Centre broke into cheers during the 10th Extraordinary African Union Summit as 44 African countries signed the historical African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) agreement. All the years of hard work had come to fruition and Africa was finally on its way to claim its position on the world trade negotiation table. But how did this idea, which many say was floated as far back as over 40 years ago, make its way to Kigali and finally into history books? “It has been a long process,” Albert Muchanga, the Commissioner, Africa Union Trade and Industry, said in an interview. Muchanga explained that the process goes as far back as when the African Union, then Organisation of African Unity, was conceived in 1963. “What most people are seeing is something we started in 2015, but the reality is that this whole thing started when the African Union was conceived. At the time, Kwame Nkrumah, the first President of Ghana, made a passionate call for the unification of Africa,” he said. Delivered in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, before 31 African Heads of State on May 24, 1963, Nkrumah’s speech, which has since become iconic, called for the creation of a strong continental union. “No independent African state today by itself has a chance to follow an independent course of economic development, and many of us who have tried to do this have been almost ruined or have had to return to the fold of the former colonial rulers. This position...

Regional governments have been urged to design policies that will facilitate and attract more women to engage in cross-border trade. Jim Kabeho, the East African Business Council (EABC) chairman, said this would help improve regional trade and also strengthen the East African Community (EAC) integration process, according to a statement from the organisation. “We recognise the role of women toward increasing cross-border trade. That’s why EAC governments and other stakeholders should work to create avenues that will help attract more women in cross-border business as a means of ensuring inclusiveness and equal opportunities for all regional citizens,” Kabeho said during a two-day summit on women in intra-regional trade in Nairobi, Kenya. Supported by GIZ, the summit is discussing ways of addressing challenges women face while doing business in the region, as well as mechanisms on how they can work together and benefit from opportunities presented by the regional market. The summit is part of activities to mark the EABC’s 20th anniversary. TradeMark Africa figures indicate that 35 per cent of total businesses in the region are owned by women, while they make up 70 per cent of the informal business sector. Targeted interventions are necessary to support them and enhance their chances of benefiting from the opportunities offered by the EAC integration, according to Kabeho. He also called on financial institutions to fund women projects that are geared towards boosting cross-border trade. He added that there is need to sensitise women entrepreneurs on regional and international trade standards to make...

At its 2012 summit, the African Union validated a plan to set up an African Continental Free Trade Area by 2017. Six high-profile deliberations later, Africa is on the cusp of realising the African renaissance dream envisioned by post-Independence Pan-African visionaries. On Wednesday, the AU chairman, Rwanda’s President Paul Kagame, joined by Kenya’s President Uhuru Kenyatta and other African leaders, signed the continental trade deal and ushered in, perhaps, the biggest bet yet on Africa. The AfCFTA will single-handedly create a single market for goods and services in Africa, possibly growing intra-Africa trade from 12 per cent to nearly double that by 2022. This will create demand for manufactured goods and exponentially lead to growth in industrial production. EMPLOYMENT Kenya’s manufacturing sector contributes a paltry 10 per cent to gross domestic product (GDP). A well-executed AfCFTA will increase the manufacturing-to-GDP figure by contributing as much as $3.4 trillion by the year 2050. Going by the massive billion-strong African population, Kenya stands to gain a lot. The expected catalytic effect is a long-yearned-for fundamental transformation of African economies, which should positively tilt their growth potential and structurally transform them. If well executed, the AfCFTA could trigger the creation of jobs for the millions of unemployed African youth. But that has to be driven by a recalibration of trade between African countries. PRIVATE SECTOR To spur the great opportunity heralded by the AfCFTA, African countries must collectively adopt a remarkable turnaround on their industrial transformation policies. They should focus on building more...

African leaders gathered in Kigali have signed the Continental Free Trade Area (CFTA) treaty to create the world’s largest single market. The agreement, signed by more than 40 African nations, is said to be the largest since the creation of the World Trade Organisation. The pact aims at boosting intra-Africa trade by making Africa a single market of 1.2 billion people with a cumulative gross domestic product of more than $3.4 trillion. “For Africa, after decades of independence, marked by persistent under-development and a marginal place in the international system, the terms of the debate are laid down in almost Manichean terms: Unite or Perish, as Kwame Nkrumah said at the Addis Ababa founding Summit,” African Union Commission chairman Moussa Faki Mahamat told heads of states and governments at the signing ceremony. “Our peoples, our business community and our youth, in particular, cannot wait any longer to see the lifting of the barriers that divide our continent, hinder its economic take-off and perpetuate misery, even though Africa is abundantly endowed with wealth,” Mr Mahamat said. Of the 55 African Union member states, 44 countries signed the pact establishing the CTFA and 43 nations the Kigali Declaration launching the free trade area. Notable of among those that failed to sign the deal is the continent’s largest economy, Nigeria, with President Muhammadu Buhari having skipped the AU summit amid reservations on the treaty. Some 27 countries also signed the Protocol on Free Movement of Persons and the African Passport. The protocol allows...

President Uhuru Kenyatta was in Kigali yesterday to join other African leaders in sigining a new trade agreement. The African Continental Free Trade Area, which has been in the works for six years, will bring together 55 countries with a combined population of 1.2 billion and GDP of about Sh344.08 trillion. The trade pact, which includes Protocol on Trade in Goods, Protocol on Trade in Services and Protocol on Dispute Settlement, is expected to reduce tariff and non-tariff barriers which hamper intra-African trade. Nigeria and Uganda did not sign the agreement and sought more time. Signatory states will commit to absolving tariffs on 90 per cent of goods with 10 per cent of “sensitive items” to be phased out after further deliberations. It will also address licensing rules and quotas presented in non-tariff barriers. “Kenya has already removed tariffs on 37 per cent of total tariffs under the EAC Common External Tariff so Kenya will effectively remove tariffs on about 53 per cent of total tariffs,” Trade PS Chris Kiptoo told the Star. “The AfCFTA also provides for mechanisms on addressing non tariff barriers which has been a major hindrance to intra-African Trade.” AfCFTA, which will come into force after it has been signed by either 15 or 22 states - a number that has yet to be agreed on - will need to be ratified by the individual countries through respective domestic processes. This will lead to a second phase of negotiations which will be held later to cover...

African heads of states and business leaders from across the continent gathered in Rwanda's capital Kigali on Wednesday (March 21), ahead of a historic signing of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), an agreement that would pave the way for continental commerce. Meeting business leaders ahead of the signing on Wednesday, Rwanda's president Paul Kagame addressed delegates and reiterated the need for the treaty, which he said would boost low levels of intra-regional trade, key to the continent's economic well-being. "This agreement is about trade in goods and services. These are the kinds of complex products that drive high income economies," said Kagame. However, the event was overshadowed by the announcement that Nigeria's President Muhammadu Buhari will not be attending Wednesday's signing of the framework agreement. AfCFTA, the brainchild of the African Union was meant to be signed by all 55 members states of the AU, bringing together 1.2 billion people with a combined gross domestic product (GDP) of more than 2 trillion US Dollars. Nigeria, the continent's most populous country had been one of the foremost champions of the AfCFTA which has been in the works since 2012. Implications of Nigeria not joining Analysts say Buhari may have caved under pressure from local labour unions and big corporations who have opposed the treaty saying it would harm the local economy. Analysts say Nigeria's withdrawal from the treaty would be a huge blow to the continent, although hopes are still high that the West African giant will join in...

Three years of talks are expected to culminate in the creation of an almost $3 trillion African trade bloc on Wednesday, with the exception of one of the continent’s biggest economies. While the continent’s heads of state are gathering in the Rwandan capital, Kigali, for an extraordinary summit of the African Union to sign an agreement creating the free-trade zone of more than 50 countries, at least two presidents won’t agree to the deal. President Muhammadu Buhari of Nigeria, which together with South Africa makes up half of the continent’s gross domestic product, canceled his trip to Kigali, saying his government needs more time for input from local businesses before he can sign the pact. Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni also called off his travels to neighboring Rwanda, the Nairobi-based East African newspaper reported on Monday. Even if some don’t sign the deal yet, negotiations will continue, Trudi Hartzenberg, an executive director for Stellenbosch-based Trade Law Centre, said by phone. “The challenges will be on issues such as import tariffs and the rules of origin,” she said. Three regional groups on the continent -- the Common Market for East and Southern Africa, the Eastern African Community and the Southern African Development Community -- signed an agreement in June 2015 to create a trade bloc covering 26 countries as a precursor to the continental grouping. A week later, members of the African Union started talks for the establishment of the continent-wide free trade area. Intra-Regional Trade Intra-Africa trade stands at about 16...