Africa is lagging behind in the lucrative global digital economy, worth around $12tn globally. With the African  Continental Free Trade Agreement in force, it is time to launch a continent-wide digital revolution to keep pace with the rest of the world. By Thierry Zomahoun On 30 May 2019, the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) officially came into force. Like most African leaders and a large proportion of informed observers, I remain convinced that the AfCFTA is an opportunity for the development and integration of our continent. A free trade area that includes nearly a billion consumers will surely prove to be a powerful driver of economic growth in the sectors that can ensure our continent emerges. One of these is the digital economy. Africa is still lagging behind in this area. You might even think that Africa has resigned itself to sitting out this competition that is already shaping tomorrow’s world. There is a digital re-colonisation looming over our continent. Perhaps you have heard about what we call ‘unicorns’. These are online micro-enterprises that started from nothing and built a stellar empire within a few years. Take note – of the 575 known unicorns across the world, only three of them came out of Africa. This African lag can be explained by a number of factors, one of which is an inadequate infrastructure, not to mention the shortage of requisite skills. These are real challenges holding back the growth of innovation and the emergence of industries linked to new technologies. Such barriers...

Residents of Budalang'i in Busia County have started feeling the effects of a  government order to close the border to human traffic. Locals said they depend heavily on food brought in from Uganda, thus the travel restrictions could result in some families sleeping hungry.“If the government is ready to distribute relief food, that will be good for us in Budalang’i," said Rael Akumu, a cereals trader who was unable to replenish her stock with grains from across the neighbouring country. Following the order to close the border to human traffic from Port Victoria in Budalang’i to Malaba, only heavy commercial vehicles are being allowed across. On Tuesday, police chased away traders who operate in Kenya's Sofia area, which borders the country's no-man's land with Uganda.Jane Atieno said she has been crossing the border for the last seven years to buy fruits, onions, tomatoes and vegetables in Sofia, Uganda. "Our bread basket is Uganda. We source foodstuff from there and since the closure of the border, it has been hard for us to cross," she said.Kenya National Chamber of Commerce and Industries Busia vice chairman Sylvanus Abungu warned that the directive will have far-reaching negative economic effects. Mr Abungu said Kenya imports millet, maize, cassava, sweet potatoes, fish, milk, eggs and sugar from Uganda.Other commodities include sugarcane, charcoal, timber and cereals, which are later transported across the country."Informal cross-border trade is the worst hit. Busia is the gateway to markets outside the region and it is already affected. If the government...

With border closures announced to contain the spread of the corona virus pandemic, the road transport sector has been hardest hit. The road transport accounts for over 60 percent of goods movement from ports of entry to the region. Besides shutting of the borders, more checks have been introduced to minimize exposure and curtail export of the virus. Logistics experts have predicted business could reduce by more than half going forward, with players calling for measures to minimize disruption and provide a critical service. Kagure Wamunyu, Africa region chief executive officer at Kobo 360, said logistics business will drop by 50 percent since borders trucks are spending up to two days before they cross the border due to the stringent checks. Kobo, a freight logistics firm, connects and supports cargo owners, truckers, drivers and importers. “The logistics sector has been disrupted by the pandemic and will suffer the sharpest blow. Developing a supply chain response to the coronavirus outbreak is extremely challenging, given the scale of the crisis and the rate at which it is evolving,” Ms Wamunyu told Shipping & Logistics in a phone interview. She said since road transport plays a crucial role in linking industries with the ports where raw materials are delivered, there is need for quick solutions to the current challenges. Kenya’s borders with Uganda and Tanzania have been shut, with minimal truck movement. This has led to delays in delivery of goods within the region. Mombasa is the gateway to East African countries of...

The implementation of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) in Eastern Africa could result in welfare gains amounting to USD 1.8 billion for East Africa, boosting intra-African exports by more than USD 1.1 billion and creating more than 2 million new jobs, says a new report. This report, entitled: “Creating a Unified Regional Market - Towards the Implementation of The African Continental Free Trade Area in East Africa” jointly published by the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and Trademark East Africa, was launched in Nairobi, Kenya. Betty Maina, Kenya’s minister for trade and industrialisation, explained that her country pursues growth in trade by identifying different markets to its products. She stressed that to maximise benefits from the AfCFTA, greater attention must be geared towards supply chains in agricultural commodities and processed food products to scale it up to the continental level. “We need to up our game and I am glad that large numbers of young people enter the food processing industry, which provides a lot of jobs for our youth”, she said. Stephen Karingi, Director Regional Integration and Trade Division at the ECA, who also attended the event, said that by 2040 the AfCFTA has the potential to increase the value of agricultural and food exports on the continent by US$16.8 billion. Karingi noted that according to recent estimates by ECA, the largest percentage increases - that is over 25 per cent in intra-African exports for industrial sectors - are found in textile, wearing apparel, leather, wood...

ADDIS ABABA, March 9 (Xinhua) -- Effective implementation of the African Continental Free Trade Area Agreement (AfCFTA) could result in welfare gains amounting to 1.8 billion U.S. dollars for East African economies, while boosting intra-African exports by more than 1.1 billion U.S. dollars and creating more than 2 million new jobs, according to a new United Nations report. The newly published report, entitled "Creating a Unified Regional Market, Towards the Implementation of AfCFTA in East Africa" and jointly published by the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and Trademark East Africa over the weekend, provided a first comprehensive assessment of the potential impact of the continental free trade deal on the East African economies. The report, which discusses the measures and supportive instruments that will be needed towards the success of the AfCFTA, mainly analyzed existing patterns of intra-regional trade and investment as well as the opportunities created by access to more open domestic and regional markets under the free trade pact. According to the report, the elimination of tariffs and non-tariff barriers required by the AfCFTA "will boost intra-African trade and improve developmental prospects for East Africa, allowing regional firms to tap into the rapidly growing markets both within the region and throughout Africa." It, however, stressed that many of the expected gains could be undermined if the needs and concerns of the private sector are not heard in order to gain an understanding of the impact on the affected sectors. The report also noted that establishing regular platforms...

ADDIS ABEBA – The implementation of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) in Eastern Africa could result in welfare gain amounting to USD 1.8 billion for East Africa, a new report says. It could also boost intra-African exports by more than USD 1.1 billion and creating more than 2 million new jobs, says report jointly published by the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and Trademark East Africa. Stephen Karingi, Director Regional Integration and Trade Division at the ECA, said that by 2040 the AfCFTA has the potential to increase the value of agricultural and food exports on the continent by US$16.8 billion. Largest percentage increases – that is over 25 per cent in intra-African exports for industrial sectors – are found in textile, wearing apparel, leather, wood and paper, vehicle and transport, agro-foods such milk and dairy products, sugar, beverages, vegetables, fruit, nuts and rice, according to ECA’s recent estimates. Boosts to intra-African trade According to the report, the elimination of tariffs and non-tariff barriers required by the Agreement will boost intra-African trade and improve developmental prospects for East Africa, allowing regional firms to tap into the rapidly growing markets both within the region and throughout Africa. However, the report stresses that many of the expected gains could be undermined if the needs and concerns of the private sector are not heard in order to gain an understanding of the impact on the affected sectors This requires an understanding of needs at all levels including large, small and...

Local regulators have for long grappled with firms that have grown too big for oversight and whose success has at times been detrimental to consumers. Some have tended to abuse their dominance by locking out new entrants while dictating prices and other industry issues for consumers who do not have alternatives.Cartels, too, some aided by monopolies and government agencies, have proved a hard nut to crack for regulators, not just locally but regionally.A recent study by the World Bank blamed the cartels and monopolistic behaviour by large firms dealing in food as being directly responsible for keeping more than 270,000 people in absolute poverty. This is just one industry, and the numbers could rise sharply when anti-competitive behaviour is evaluated in other sectors. Opening markets Successful implementation of the Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) could deal a major blow to the cartels and monopolies that have resisted regulators in the past, according to a report by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (Uneca) and TradeMark Africa (TMA). The report notes that AfCFTA’s opening up of markets will enable other firms from across the borders to bring in formidable competition to monopolies or duopolies that have a firm hold on East Africa’s economies.The report published last week noted that East Africans stand to be major beneficiaries of the break-up of anti-competitive behaviour perfected by local firms and multinationals. Such firms, it noted, have had a stranglehold on key industries and markets to the extent that they solely determine prices...

IOTA Foundation, a non-profit foundation focused on distributed ledger technology (DLT) and open-source ecosystem development, announced today a partnership with TradeMark Africa (TMA). The goal of the partnership is to help TMA in its mission to improve East African trade and global competitiveness using IOTA’s distributed ledger technology. TMA works closely with the East African community institutions, national governments, the private sector and civil society organizations to increase trade by reducing current barriers and by improving business competitiveness. Currently, Africa has vast, unlocked potential that has not yet been realized, due to its lack of physical and digital trading infrastructure. This greatly affects the economic prosperity of the continent. TMA’s goal is to increase trade by improving the trade system in East Africa, leading to an enhanced economy and a reduction in poverty, particularly in sectors and geographic areas that depend on international trade. In order to take advantage of trade opportunities, the private sector in Eastern Africa must produce safe and competitive goods on time for its customers. “It is key to us that introducing new technologies is not a lock-in but puts the control into the hands of the government and the traders. Public infrastructure must avoid any potential to monopolize the control or the data with a few private actors - and give value to all actors independent of size. This partnership provides us access to a technology where we can test the value of decentralized data management and have control mechanisms of the underlying infrastructure. Equally...

Africa took a giant stride along the path of increased economic co-operation, with the launch of the Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) in March 2018. The move was widely hailed as a major milestone towards the long-standing goal of creating a unified continental market. AfCFTA is hailed as one of the most exciting new developments on the continent, with the potential to connect African countries from the Atlantic to the Indian Ocean, and from Cape Town to Cairo. By liberalising trade, AfCFTA will help countries grow economies and create jobs. If fully implemented, AfCFTA would see the creation of the world’s largest free trade area since inauguration of the World Trade Organisation in 1995, boasting a domestic market of more than 1.2 billion people, and a collective gross domestic product of $2.6 trillion. Effective implementation of AfCFTA would be transformational. The African Development Bank has forecast that elimination of bilateral tariffs on goods and services would increase intra-African trade by 15 per cent. Yet significant barriers remain beyond tariffs. Without a focus on implementation, we could see a trade agreement that is largely unusable. Many African countries are members of several regional economic communities — the East African Community, the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa, the Southern African Development Community and the Economic Community of West African States — applying different rules of origin, trading standards and cross-border procedures, all making it costly to trade. The World Bank Doing Business report for 2020 shows that while it...

he purpose of national economic reform is to change the structure and overall direction of an economy. Reforms therefore can affect the amount of resources available to a country. They can also affect human rights. South Africa desperately needs to reform its economy. Its capacity to deal with its tragic problems of unemployment, poverty and inequality is diminishing. State owned enterprises like the power utility Eskom, public transport group Prasa and South Africa Airways, are failing to deliver adequate services. They are also draining public resources away from more productive and socially beneficial purposes. And the country’s economy is too carbon intensive. It needs to transition to less carbon intensive forms of production and consumption. The South African government’s proposed responses to these challenges are controversial. They involve job losses and cuts in social services. Government claims that over time the reforms will yield more jobs, better services and a growing economy that is environmentally sustainable. Unfortunately, while the short term costs are clear, the long term benefits are uncertain. Even if they arrive, they may not benefit the groups bearing the short term losses. The same is true about the alternatives. For example, the mining sector’s efforts to protect the coal industry may preserve jobs but at the cost of the long term health of children. Efforts by trade union to preserve wages for public sector workers may mean fewer jobs in the public sector for today’s students and learners. In short, all these options may produce substantial benefits....