The European Union and COMESA have signed 8.8 million Euros Contribution Agreement to increase private sector participation in sustainable regional and global value chains through improved investment/business climate and enhanced competitiveness in the COMESA region. The funds will be used to implement the Regional Enterprise Competitiveness and Access to Markets Program (RECAMP), focusing on agro-processing, horticulture and leather products. RECAMP will also support pre-selected value chains based on the potential to generate value addition, job creation and attraction of investments to the region. The EU Ambassador to Zambia and Permanent Representative to COMESA, HE Jacek Jankowski and Secretary-General to COMESA Chileshe Kapwepwe signed the Agreement. RECAMP will address critical issues, such as the provision of business information, facilitating market linkages, harmonizing regional industrial policies and creating a conducive business environment to attract investments. It will strive to ensure collaboration with activities of national trade support institutions and business development and service organizations in the Member States as they provide services to value chains as part of their mandate. These include product development; facilitate technology transfer, provision of business intelligence and connection to buyers. The program will identify champions or lead firms within the selected value chains that have both backward and forward linkages with SMEs and other intermediary firms in order to enhance effect coordination reduce coordination failures and improve competitiveness. In her remarks, Ms Kapwepwe said the program will make efforts to enhance the capacities and skills of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises to make them capable players in...

As lockdowns and curfews are being gradually eased across Africa, the continent faces turbulent times ahead as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to impact the global economy. Already, the harsh economic fallout of stringent lockdowns seems to have been felt more keenly by families across the continent than the disease itself, pushing people with little or no savings and limited access to government support either back or further into poverty. The World Bank forecasts the African continent will experience its first recession this century and some report a potential 3% GDP contraction. The impact on jobs will be huge. McKinsey estimates  that between 9 million and 18 million formal jobs will be lost across Africa, and 100 million informal jobs (of which women make up 75%) are vulnerable to loss of income. Development gains undone Many businesses that were booming and families that were thriving just a few weeks ago now face incredibly challenging times. Failure to protect jobs will have major ramifications for the continent’s resilience and long-term sustainable development. This alone risks undoing many of the development gains that have been hard won over the last decade. These issues are compounded by a perfect storm of declining commodity prices and reduced export volumes, as well as depleting foreign exchange reserves and triggering huge capital outflows. International and local responses to the crisis have mostly focused on immediate and medium-term needs, channelling much-needed support to cash-strapped governments and launching or expanding social safety nets to protect the most vulnerable from the impacts of lengthy lockdowns. But the economic impacts of this public...

Trade is emerging as a remedy that could reduce the Covid-19 pandemic’s adversity through flow of essential goods such as food, medical supplies and other hygiene products. This is according to a report dubbed Covid-19: Time to reboot Intra-Comesa Trade released last week. The report authored by experts Benedict Musengele and Jane Kibiru states: “The relaxation of the free movement of essential goods in the region will enhance their production and boost intra-Comesa trade during this pandemic period.” Experts further cite the implementation of the digital trade facilitation and other instruments as core in mitigating vulnerability to shocks such as Covid-19 pandemic. The report also identifies pharmaceutical products as among the top intra-Comesa traded products, which could immensely grow as the import origin markets namely EU, India, USA, China and UK are among the hard hit by Covid-19. The five contribute 45 per cent, 19 per cent 6 per cent 4 per cent and 3 per cent of the source market for pharmaceutical product to Comesa. According to an International Trade Centre report (ITC, 2020), some of these countries, UK, US, China and India have imposed export restrictions in some pharmaceutical products, which may affect their importation, yet these are critical in the fight against Covid-19. Comesa is a net importer of pharmaceutical products with exports amounting $ 442.53 million in 2018 and imports worth $ 6,451.03 million respectively. The intra- COMESA exports of pharmaceutical products constituted 32 per cent of the exports. “This shows that pharmaceuticals are a major...

As the Covid-19 crisis has escalated, stay-at-home orders have led to a surge in online purchases – of everything from groceries to medicines to household essentials – by consumers in the advanced economies. Africans facing similar movement restrictions will not enjoy the same convenience – or the safety it affords. Over the last decade, a growing middle class and rapid progress in mobile and Internet penetration have supported the view that African countries are ripe for e-commerce success. Consumer spending across the continent is projected to reach $2.1 trillion by 2025, by which time mobile-phone penetration in Sub-Saharan Africa is likely to stand at 50 per cent. Yet, so far, companies have largely failed to tap Sub-Saharan Africa’s e-commerce potential, owing to logistical challenges and inefficiencies. Nigeria, the continent’s largest market, ranks 110th out of 160 countries when it comes to logistical efficiency, according to the World Bank. It can take three times as long to import an auto part through Lagos, Nigeria, than through Durban, South Africa. And it can cost up to five times more to transport goods in Sub-Saharan Africa than in the United States, based on 2015 estimates. Across the continent, a lack of integration means that companies face smaller markets and considerable red tape when crossing borders. When Alibaba was building and scaling its e-commerce ecosystem in China in 2003, it took advantage of relatively advanced urban infrastructure – the result of significant government investments in the 1990s. Thanks to that physical infrastructure, as well...

If African airlines are to survive the covid-19 pandemic onslaught, then the immediate injection of cash is needed to avoid insolvency or bankruptcy of the airlines. Carriers on the continent are expected to lose US$ 8.1bn in revenues this year in the severe and an unprecedented event which is forcing players under the African Airlines Association (AFRAA) to seek more avenues for support to the industry. The Afreximbank has however assured that there are existing opportunities for African airlines under the bank’s Pandemic Trade Impact Mitigation Facility (PATIMFA). Covid-19 pushes Kenya’s luxurious hotel out of business AFRAA’s Secretary-General, Abdérahmane Berthé notes that the impact of the pandemic is enormous and it could lead to insolvency or bankrupting African airlines in 2020. The continental airlines’ body headquartered in Nairobi has proposed setting up an aviation sectorial covid-19 recovery fund for the support of the airline industry. “We will continue to seek more avenues for support to the industry from development finance institutions, country development partners and international donors as we navigate through these tough times,” added Berthe. On June 2, AFRAA released an analysis of the impact of the pandemic on the airline industry in Africa which reveals an estimated revenue loss of US$ 8.103 billion this year. The analysis is the first in a series of studies that will be published by the Association examining the toll of the pandemic on Africa’s air transport sector. The impact assessment analysis further shows a 90.3 per cent year on year passenger traffic...

NAMANGA, Kenya — They haul food, fuel and other essential supplies along sometimes dangerous roads during tough economic times. But Africa's long-distance truckers say they are increasingly being accused of carrying something else: the coronavirus. While hundreds of truckers have tested positive for the virus in recent weeks, the drivers say they are being stigmatized and treated like criminals, being detained by governments and slowing cargo traffic to a crawl. That has created a challenge for governments in much of sub-Saharan Africa, where many borders remain closed by the pandemic, on how to strike a balance between contagion and commerce. Countries are struggling to reach common ground. “When I entered Tanzania, in every town that I would drive through, they would call me, ’You, corona, get away from here with your corona!’” said Abdulkarim Rajab, a burly Kenyan who has been driving trucks for 17 years and recalls when drivers were being accused of spreading HIV during that outbreak. Rajab and his load of liquefied gas spent three days at the Kenya-Tanzania border, where the line of trucks waiting to be cleared stretched into the distance and wound around the lush hills overlooking the crossing at Namanga. Tanzania closed the border there this week, protesting Kenya's efforts to re-test all incoming truckers, including those who even had certificates showing they had been tested in the previous 14 days. It was the second time the frontier was closed in less than a month and was taken after many Tanzanian truckers with...

United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (Addis Ababa) Nairobi — The African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) is still the agreement with great potential to foster regional economic integration and economic growth, and take Africa to the next level, even in the midst of a crippling coronavirus crisis, panellists on a COVID-19 Recovery Mechanism and AfCFTA webinar agreed Thursday. The panelists agreed the AfCFTA was a crucial move towards removing the continent's heavy reliance on commodity and agricultural exports leading to exponential growth in the manufacturing sector, export diversification and creation of quality jobs if its full potential to be transformational for all Africans is tapped. Regional Integration Division Director at the Economic Commission for Africa, Mr. Stephen Karingi, in his remarks said a lot of empirical work had been done by ECA showing what the AfCFTA means for Africa. "One of the things we have been able to demonstrate empirically is that the AfCFTA has the potential to deepen not only the regional integration of the continent but also to allow us to do more value addition in our production processes," he said. This, added Mr. Karingi, presents an opportunity not only to create economic resilience but also create quality and more valuable jobs compared to jobs that are not based on industry. "We know what the AfCFTA means for this continent. COVID-19 has exposed that had we implemented the AfCFTA earlier, we would be in a better position than we are now," he said, adding the ECA's analytical...

Of all the legacies of colonialism, one of those which has most hampered economic growth and the alleviation of poverty is fragmentation – neighbours with different currencies, regulations enabling trade with Europe but not with other Africans, and a neglect of intra-African transport and infrastructure links to facilitate this trade. In good times, with Europe accounting for around 30% of African trade, there has been little appetite to upset the status quo. In times of economic unease, African nations, like many around the world, have tended to withdraw into themselves rather than pursue broader trading options. Repeating this pattern for a generation, African nations have historically ceded economic power to external actors, remaining price-takers and struggling to develop their own solutions at times of crisis. Change is in the air A confluence of factors is lining up to shift Africa from the old way of doing things and drive the continent towards greater prosperity and resilience. The rise of China as an economic force and major partner (19% of Africa’s trade) has given African leaders experience in opening new trade routes and the benefits this brings. At the same time, regional trading blocs like SADC, EAC, COMESA or ECOWAS have grown in strength as countries became more adept at spotting gaps in their neighbors’ markets and adjusting areas of specialization to meet demand. Building on a decade long trajectory towards greater continental integration and more diverse trading relations, the ratification of the African Continental Free Trade Area (‘AfCFTA’) now has the capacity to...

The African Import-Export Bank (Afreximbank) and International Trade Centre (ITC) team up to help businesses make the most of the African Continental Free Trade Area (Cairo/Geneva) − Afreximbank is teaming up with ITC to train small business owners and young entrepreneurs in Africa to trade with other African countries as part of the new African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA). The training programme, How to Export within the AfCFTA, is being launched as the new free-trade area comes on stream and amid the economic strain of climate change and the coronavirus pandemic. The training will give business owners the knowledge and skills they need to engage effectively in cross-border trade under terms of the emerging free-trade area for Africa. Intra-African trade is structurally low at 15% (compared to Europe at nearly 70%, for example), and the AfCFTA will open a market of 1.2 billion people. 'Against the backdrop of the current COVID-19 health and economic crisis, African micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) need support to take full advantage of the continental market,' ITC acting Executive Director Dorothy Tembo said. 'Through this partnership, African businesses will have the opportunity to learn, plan and succeed in growing their business by taking full advantage of the AfCFTA.' Kanayo Awani, Managing Director of Afreximbank's Intra-African Trade Initiative, said that the initiative was necessary because promoting intra-African trade through increased exports of goods and services by small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) was the cornerstone of the AFCFTA. It signals an optimal strategy to aid businesses...

The Economic Commission for Africa has reported that between 300,000 and 3.3 million people on the continent could lose their lives to COVID-19. It has the opportunity to implement systems to support its nations through coronavirus, and into the future. These include free trade, regional value chains and infrastructure investment. The African Continental Free Trade Area was launched two years ago at an African Union (AU) summit in Kigali. It was scheduled to be implemented from 1 July 2020. But this has been pushed out until 2021 because of the impact of COVID-19 and the need for leaders to focus on saving lives. Studies by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa and others state that the free trade area has the potential to increase growth, raise welfare and stimulate industrial development on the continent. But there are concerns. Some countries, particularly smaller and more vulnerable states, could be hurt. For example, they could suffer revenue losses and other negative effects from premature liberalisation. The impact of COVID-19 will only worsen these structural weaknesses. The Economic Commission for Africa has reported that between 300,000 and 3.3 million people could lose their lives if appropriate measures are not taken. There are several reasons for this level of high risk. These include the fact that 56% of urban dwellings are in overcrowded slums, 71% of Africa’s workforce is informally employed and cannot work from home and 40% of children on the continent are undernourished. Free Trade has the potential to increase growth and...