More To Digest...

Insight: Lowering tariffs may not the magic wand for promoting businesses and helping economies grow. But what lies in the value proposition of AfCFTA is its offer for incremental and long-term benefit in creating new markets for goods and services.

Check: The Brooking Institution has this forecast for Africa through 2021, where it dedicated Chapter Five to address economic integration. The COVID-19 may have dealt the speedy implementation of the African Continent Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) a blow. But Brooking insists that leaders in Africa “must move forward with the ambitious project.”

Learn: six benefits of a free trade regime worth pursuing between African countries, which may help the continent change the game in itsfavour.

Guide: Businesses based in Africa or those from the outside but working with the continent can learn the nitty-gritty of the AfCFTA treaty.

Feast: For those data nerds, here are graphs and statistics to devour trade in Africa.

Read from Latest Editions

African Economic Development

Teaming up with Oxford academics, Christopher Cramer and John Sender, Arkebe Oqubay (PhD) has co-authored a book on African economic...


Why the extent of intra-African trade is much higher than commonly believed—and what this means for the AfCFTA

It has become truism that free trade will not solve all of Africa’s problems...


Toward the African Continental Free Trade Area : The Effects of Economic Integration and Democracy on Real Misalignments across Exchange Rate Regimes

For those interested to see the correlation between economic integration, democracy and currency misalignments across exchange rate regimes in Africa,

Interview with Mr Rowland Ataguba - The African High Speed Railway Network

The free trade area in Africa hardly succeeds in the absence of an integrated high speed rail network covering much of the continent, argues Rowland Ataguba, managing director of Bethlehem Rail Infrastructure. Such an integrated network of freight and p...